The Loss of Ours
by Polexia Aphrodite
Summary: A brief and heretofore untold history of the life, marriage, and survival of Severus Snape. AU-ish, but Deathly Hallows-compliant. Snape/OC. COMPLETE.
1. Prologue

The Loss of Ours: Prologue

By Polexia Aphrodite

Rating: T

Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter, J.K. Rowling does.

Summary: A history of Severus Snape's youth, survival, and marriage. AU-ish. SS/OC.

Author's Notes: This story was impossible to summarize. Anyway, it's another foray of mine into Severus/OC. Huge thanks should go to the Harry Potter Lexicon, my greatest ally in writing this. Hope you like it! Reviews are appreciated!

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**"He desired her, that was all," sneered Voldemort, "but when she had gone he agreed that there were other women, and of purer blood, worthier of him-"**

**-_Harry Potter and the __Deathly Hallows, Chapter 36: The Flaw in the Plan_**

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**1998:**

Except for her wringing hands and the carefully measured rise and fall of her breath, Louisa sat almost perfectly still in the waiting room of St. Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries. A door ahead of her opened slowly. Professor McGonagall moved towards her in that delicate, cautious way of moving often adopted in hospitals, libraries, or museums.

"He's not conscious," she whispered, glancing suspiciously at the others waiting in the lobby, "but you can see him."

Louisa nodded and rose, ignoring the older witch's stilted, reluctant tone. She had been so thoroughly dazed by the news of the last few hours that she found herself unable to focus on anything besides entering that room ahead of her. The thought of seeing him again had ripped her out of her despair and now it had become all-consuming.

McGonagall put a hesitating hand on her arm.

"I must warn you," she began, "he doesn't look…well."

Louisa strode ahead. Her hand grabbed the cool doorknob, it turned, opened, she entered. He laid in a standard, small, St. Mungo's bed. The crisp, white sheets pulled taut over his still body. His bare shoulders and head were visible. As she moved closer, feeling more and more lightheaded, she could see the thick, white gauze wrapped around his throat and the spread of black and blue skin that spread down to his collar bone and up to his jawline.

She reached out a hand to touch the lump of blanket that indicated the location of his arm and sighed.

"Oh, Severus"


	2. Strangers, Not Friends

The Loss of Ours: Chapter 1

By Polexia Aphrodite

Rating: T

Summary: Hogwarts and how it all began.

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**1974**:

Louisa Rosier had seen Severus before, but never really looked at him until the start of her third year.

She knew that he was friends with her brother, but Evan had made a concentrated effort to ignore her since the middle of his second year (her first) and she barely ever talked to him or any of the other fourth years. But she certainly knew them by reputation. Avery was the handsome, foppish one the girls in her dormitory whispered about; Rodolphus was the swarthy one that had asked Sylvia Poste to Hogsmeade the year before; Wilkes was the blond one whose wicked glares sent first years running; Regulus was the quiet, aristocratic third year that had somehow infiltrated their circle; and then there was Severus. Severus was the one who, rumor had it, had been nearly expelled for his violent hexes at least a dozen times. Together, they formed an impressive bunch. They were the epitome of danger, glamour, and mystery to the thirteen-year-old Louisa.

It was in that year that the fourth year group solidified, inspiring countless other Slytherins, Louisa among them, to long to join their furtive conversations in the back of the Common Room.

At that year's commencement speech, she had looked down the long Slytherin table and inexplicably met Severus' glance. He was tall, thin, unusual, and she had heartily agreed with her friends that he was the least attractive of the Slytherin fourth years. But, to Louisa, it wasn't just his appearance that made him unattractive. Even at her young age, she sensed something too dangerous, too dark, about him, and it made her shiver and look away quickly that night.

As the year progressed into winter, she found her gaze increasingly drawn to him, usually during meals or when she discovered him in the musty avenues of the school's ancient library. She never spoke to him, being too intimidated by his age and demeanor. She didn't like him (a fact of which she was certain, having never experienced the giddy, fluttering sensation that gazing at Regulus Black often inspired), but instead found herself observing him as though he were a scientific specimen. Years later, she would find journals from her school days with the occasional idly written comments about Severus' quick, anxious movements, blank stares, or the oddity of his remaining at Hogwarts over holiday breaks.

**1975** :

Winter thawed into spring, and she came to notice that she always saw him with that girl. That red-haired Gryffindor girl. Something about her made Louisa's stomach clench.

It might have been because she was a mudblood, or because she was a Gryffindor, which, Evan was beginning to teach her, were almost equally bad. But there was something else. Something about the way Severus made that girl smile, the way their heads almost touched when they whispered together in the library, that made Louisa's eyes narrow and her chest burn.

It was a sensation that only increased as spring bled into the warmth of summer. In time, her discomfort became deeply felt suspicion. Louisa asked her brother why he associated with Severus if his blood was as bad as any other mudblood's. Evan had told her that Severus was valuable and that he had knowledge that was useful, though she couldn't have fully known what he meant then.

Evan had introduced her to Narcissa that autumn. She met Lucius. And Mulciber. It was the year that Evan stopped rolling up his sleeves.

**1976**:

Louisa hadn't been present on the bright, hot June afternoon when Severus had called the red-haired girl a mudblood. She wished she had been. She wanted to see the hurt on Lily Evans' face.

When school started again, Louisa in her fifth year, Evan in his sixth, Severus seemed more distant than ever. Some of Evan's friends started talking to her, asking what spells and hexes she knew, what she thought of mudbloods, but not Severus.

Severus Snape seemed angrier, darker, more vindictive than ever. He started teaching the other Slytherins new curses. He stopped rolling up his sleeves.


	3. Watching History Unfold

The Loss of Ours: Chapter 2

By Polexia Aphrodite

Rating: T

Summary: A recruitment, a marriage, and a death.

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**1977**:

Louisa was sixteen years old. Evan started inviting her to parties in the darkened rooms of elegant, isolated mansions. She met Bellatrix, whose chilly beauty had fascinated Louisa.

It was at one such gathering of present and future Death Eaters that Severus had first spoken to her. She had seen his sidelong glances at her brother and knew that the conversation had been orchestrated, perhaps as an effort to force Severus into more active participation in the Dark Lord's recruiting efforts.

Severus had asked her what she thought about school, the Gryffindors, the parties, the people. She answered as cleverly as she could, trying desperately to ignore the rapid blood coursing through her veins, the pounding of her pulse. Over the din of the party, he had bent near her to speak. She still knew that she didn't like him, but up close she could see that the creases of his hands were stained dark by potions ingredients, he smelled like Hogwarts' lemon-scented soap and she could feel the heat of his body radiating through his wool robes to warm her bared shoulders and arms.

She replayed the conversation endlessly in her mind. Hours later, the excited tension she felt had not dissipated. It dulled her senses enough to allow her to let Barty Crouch Jr. kiss her in one of the mansion's shadowy corridors even though he was two years too young and his inexperienced hands groped her too roughly.

**1980**:

She was nineteen when her brother was killed. She had sat through the funeral, hearing nothing, seeing nothing, enveloped by her own grief. Only Severus and Narcissa Malfoy had been present. Narcissa had professed her husband and sister's condolences, secretly whispering that it had been too dangerous for them to be present. Louisa had nodded numbly, feeling the cool, waxy press of the older woman's artificially-reddened lips to her cheek before she swept from the gravesite, a blur of blonde hair and ostentatious robes, and apparated away.

Severus had approached her afterwards.

"I'm supposed to take care of you," he had stated simply.

"What?" she asked, the only response that her foggy, dazed mind could conjure.

"He wanted me to take care of you. Evan did," he repeated quietly.

"Oh."

He walked her home. At the door to the now-empty Rosier Estate, the pair had stood together awkwardly, finally saying their goodbyes after a long silence.

**1981**:

She met the Dark Lord. He terrified her. But she took the Mark. They all did, back then.

Severus visited her. They drank tea in silence together. She knew he mourned Evan too. They had been close. She cried in front of him only once. She had been mortified, but unable to stop the inevitable, traitorous tears.

"I'm sorry," she had gasped, one hand covering her face, the other still perched on her teacup, waiting for a return to normalcy, until he took it. He said nothing, but held her hand until the wracking, breathless sobs had stopped.

Something changed that summer. He was barely present at the Death Eater meetings, but met privately with the Dark Lord. It was the Dark Lord that had suggested the marriage. He had said, in his menacing, seductive way, that it was what Evan would have wanted. The Dark Lord often consolidated his followers through intermarriages, believing that the kinship ties would make them more loyal. Louisa agreed, though in truth she was numb to the idea and, in her grief, open to suggestion. Severus finally agreed too, seemingly eager to please his master, or eager to dispel the rumors questioning his loyalty. The Dark Lord was pleased. They were married in September. He never touched her.

In October, on that momentous night, she found him alone in the parlor of tiny Spinner's End. After the wedding, they had relocated to the significant estate of the proudly ancient Rosier family, but on that night, she had found him in his childhood home. He had been crying.

He looked up when she entered.

"Get out," there was anger in his voice, but emotion made his tone unnaturally high.

She knew it was the red-haired girl again. She knew that she was dead and she knew then that he had loved her. The thought made a hard lump grow in her throat and Louisa felt the familiar sting of suspicion and jealousy she remembered from Hogwarts.

Evan's death and his obvious trust of Severus had amended many of her former opinions of her new husband (though parts of her still rankled at the idea of having been matched with someone of such inferior birth), but the scene before her chilled her blood. Since Evan's death, Severus had been kind, if not warm, and she had dared to hope that their union might yet make itself agreeable, a thought instantly eradicated in the cramped parlor of Spinner's End. Hopelessly, she sat slowly on the sofa. She would be there for him in his grief as he had been in hers.

He railed against her and the universe for hours. She let him yell and sob and collapse and said nothing.


	4. The Seal of Always

The Loss of Ours: Chapter 3

By Polexia Aphrodite

Feedback is appreciated! Thanks to all those who have already reviewed!

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**1985**:

In four years, Louisa and Severus had settled into a pattern. They spent the summers at the Rosier estate. Severus had constructed a potions laboratory and would disappear for hours on end. She did her best to be amiable in his presence, just as a good pureblood wife should be. She managed to hold conversations with him during those summers, discovering that she could enliven him with mentions of potions articles she had read and reminiscences of the time Wilkes had hexed Flitwick or when Avery had decided, against the advice of all, to grow mutton chops.

Still he never touched her. She had not been innocent at the time of their marriage, and knew that he was not. Though she maintained perfect composure in his presence, the lack of contact frequently drove her to private explosions of frustration.

In the autumns, he would go to Hogwarts. She would see him only at Christmas.

In the winter of that year, Severus and Louisa had been invited to a gathering at the Malfoy Estate. In light of Severus' position at Hogwarts and Lucius' position at the Ministry of Magic, their re-association had been deemed safe.

The party had been mainly populated by Ministry bureaucrats, driven to attend by a curiosity to imagine their lives among the perceived glamour of Death Eater culture. Louisa had taken advantage of a lull in the festivities and her husband's distraction to wander through the halls of the baroque mansion that had been host to so many memories of her teenage years.

It had been then that Lucius had found her. He had wasted no time, backing her against a wall, his hands at her wrists. "I know he hasn't slept with you yet," he whispered roughly by her ear, "How long has it been, Lou?"

She shuddered, her eyes closed as he lifted her robes, but she let him push her onto a narrow table and wrap her legs around his waist.

Louisa and Severus had returned to the Malfoy mansion for dinner two weeks later.

The four of them had been seated around the Malfoy's ornately-carved dining table when Lucius cleared his throat. He looked directly at Severus then, his lips curling into a smile. Severus' heart caught in his throat. He knew that smile.

"You may be interested to know, Severus, that I've fucked your wife."

Narcissa blinked, but continued her meal without missing a beat. Severus said nothing. Louisa stared at her plate, feeling somewhere between crying and vomiting, knowing that Lucius had used her as he had used countless others.

Later that night, back in the more familiar confines of the Rosier Estate, Louisa had approached her husband. She had apologized, though she knew that she felt sorrier for herself than for Severus.

He had sighed, looking at her with a mix of calculation and pity.

"I've done you a disservice, I think," he said quietly, shifting his gaze away from her, "Perhaps my…inattention made you vulnerable."

She said nothing, feeling a tingling in the tip of her nose and a swelling in her throat that foretold imminent tears.

He approached her then, standing mere inches away. Her face was still downturned and Severus found himself quieting an impulse to bring his hand to lift her face, see her eyes and understand her thoughts.

"What is it?" he asked.

Louisa breathed deeply, willing her emotions to diminish. "It's just so embarrassing," she admitted.

His lips pressed together thoughtfully, "It may be useful for you to know that you're not the only one Lucius has manipulated in this way."

She bristled, "I know. Of course I know that-" She raised her eyes to his and stopped. The seriousness she saw there hinted at a secret he had kept for nearly a decade.

He looked away again, "I was young…and lost, once."

Her brow furrowed, "Are you…"

He smiled, "No. But Lucius can be very persuasive, as I'm sure you've found."

She managed to return his smile then. After a chaste kiss to his wife's cheek, he bade her goodnight, and the two retreated to their separate rooms.

**1987**:

Severus, at Dumbledore's insistence, brought Louisa to the faculty orientation at the start of term. The pair arrived late. Louisa spent the evening chatting pleasantly with the other teachers' spouses who found themselves out of place among their wife or husband's colleagues. Louisa had pulled the left sleeve of her dress down almost entirely over her hand. The thought of anyone in the agreeable, invitingly friendly group seeing that ugly, scandalous mark on her arm made her tremble.

Dumbledore chastised Severus for not having introduced Louisa earlier. Severus, in turn, basked in the distraction that Louisa provided. She had learned her considerable social skills among the most dangerous society in wizarding Britain and so diligently put them to work that night that Severus was left almost entirely alone, to his great pleasure.

The greatest recognition that Severus got that night were in the satisfied glances of the staff. They had, so they thought, figured him out. Though he was irritable, coarse, and tainted by old connections, he had something normal: a wife. Severus had no affection for his peers, but feeling somehow included among them brought an unfamiliar sense of comfort. When Louisa made eye contact with him across the room that night, she saw the first traces of real warmth.

That night, after he led her into his chambers, he thanked her.

"Why?" she asked.

He shook his head gently. It was too difficult to explain. In six years, they had shared a life, imperfect though it had been. On that occasion, and on others, she had made him seem normal, but, truthfully, she had been the first to make him _feel _normal.

But he said nothing. Instead, he kissed her. Every nerve in her body turned electric as the kiss deepened, his hand stroked her neck tentatively, her hands rested on the sides of his waist. After a series of frantic moments, the two found themselves disrobed and pressed against each other in the downy warmth of Severus' bedding.

Six years of marital celibacy were ended that night. To his never-ending shock, Severus didn't think about the red-haired girl. He didn't close his eyes and imagine her in Louisa's place. He spent every moment aware that the woman in his bed had dark hair, dark eyes, and a faded tattoo marking her left arm that matched his own. He didn't think once of touching Lily's tawny, freckled skin as he had so many times before, but instead found himself consumed by the pale, immaculate complexion before him. He spent every moment aware that it was Louisa, his wife.

The next morning, in a fit of self-flagellation, he insisted that she leave Hogwarts immediately. And she did.

**1991**:

The next years were not without moments of tenderness. Louisa cursed the affection she increasingly felt towards her distant husband and longed for the days when he barely knew who she was. It seemed preferable to the tease their marriage offered. But he had grown to be so abominably kind to her, and she was helpless to do anything but return his kindness. Still, she knew he didn't love her, at least not in the expected way for a husband to love a wife.

During those summers, there were more than enough nights that saw barely a word exchanged between the two, but as the season dragged on, Louisa would more and more often wake in the middle of the night to the rock of the mattress as he climbed into her bed, his hands running across her stomach, her legs, her breasts, his mouth on hers. The night that her name was wrenched from his lips at the moment of climax seemed to Louisa worth the subsequent three weeks of frigid treatment she received.

He continued to insist on those little moments of self-denial, knowing that he would always love the red-haired girl. He had to. Always.

That winter, Severus was unusually sullen during his holiday visit home. When Louisa asked what the matter was, he replied, "Potter. He's just like his damned father." Louisa had vague memories of James Potter. The Slytherins had been reluctant to antagonize he and Sirius at first, despite being Gryffindors, on account of their pure blood and a hope that they might one day be recruited. It wasn't until they'd publicly attacked Severus that they earned the wrath of the young Death Eaters.

Louisa knew that James wasn't the only person that the young Potter made him think about. But she gave him her best sympathetic smile anyway.

Severus began to wonder if it was guilt that made him continue to love the woman who had married another man in his stead. Ten years and the difference between the world of the living and the world of the dead had separated them. And there was Louisa, his lawful wife, who's dark features and darker past reminded him not at all of the girl he'd loved at Hogwarts but who gave him a sad smile and sat up with him late into the night listening to complaints about the infamous boy who lived.

She went to bed that night around 2 a.m. The hand she placed on his shoulder as she passed him on the way to her chambers was friendly and her soft "Goodnight" was innocent enough, but the reminder that she was really present and flesh-and-blood enough to touch and speak shook Severus. He knew that she was warm and real and willing, not just to submit to wifely duties, but to _be_ with him. And he wanted her. The thought made his eyes water uncontrollably. He had loved Lily. And he had killed her. And he would keep loving her. It was the least she deserved from him.

Severus ended his holiday early that year.


	5. Let the Needle Drop

The Loss of Ours: Chapter 4

By Polexia Aphrodite

Notes: Thought this year should stand alone. The next chapter's longer.

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**1993**:

She would always remember it as the year of her pregnancy. And the year of her miscarriage. When it happened, Dumbledore had interrupted Severus in the middle of class, called him into the corridor and told him. He left for St. Mungo's without a word.

When he entered her sterile, blank hospital room, she opened her eyes. She had been feigning sleep for hours, wanting only to be left alone. Severus took the seat beside her bed. She reached a hand out to him and he took it. She had never been paler. Dark circles rimmed her eyes. He felt an indescribable relief that she wasn't crying.

"I'm sorry," he offered, finding himself somehow unable to endure the silence any longer.

"Why?"

His brow furrowed, "Because you've…you've…" He stammered, unable to find the end to his sentence.

Her weak grip on his hand tightened.

"I'm not the only one who's lost a son today, Severus"

It knocked the wind out of him. He'd spent most of the seven months of her pregnancy at Hogwarts, easily able to ignore the idea of his imminent parenthood. And now he had had a son. Who died.

He held her hand until she fell asleep.


	6. Fists on Up

The Loss of Ours: Chapter 5

By Polexia Aphrodite

Summary: A return, a quarrel, a thwarted revenge, and a move.

Notes: So I didn't really like the previous version of this chapter. This one's got a few extra scenes I forgot to include the first time around. Let me know what you think! And thanks so much to all those who have already reviewed!

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**1995**:

It was late that June when Severus apparated into the parlour of their home well past midnight. Rushing into Louisa's room, he yanked back the covers from her sleeping form. A well-aimed swish of his wand summoned two heavy suitcases from her closet.

"Severus?" she ventured groggily.

"Get up," he barked. When he received only a half-awake stare in response, he grabbed her arm, jerking her to her feet as his wand commanded her clothing into the suitcases.

"The Dark Lord has returned," his voice was low, "We're not safe here."

"From the Aurors?" fear flashed in her eyes, she had seen what Aurors could do to Death Eaters.

"From _Him"_

"Why should we need protection from the Dark Lord?" Louisa reasoned, irritated by the early hour. She had been taught to fear the Dark Lord, but not to run from Him.

Severus' face was a mask of incredulity.

"Don't be a fool," he stepped closer, his voice lowering further, "Do you want to be His again? Can't you see that the Dark Lord and His plots killed Evan just as surely as Alastor Moody did?"

She inhaled sharply. They never spoke of Evan's death and the reminder tore through her. After it came the slow, seeping realization of the truth of her husband's words.

Without waiting for a reply, Severus took Louisa's bags, clutched her to him and disapparated.

They arrived in a vacated car park. Taking a scarf from the inner pockets of his robes, Severus bound it around her eyes, took her by the hand, and led her stumbling across pavement, dirt, grass, and pavement again for what seemed to Louisa an inordinately long period of time, before finally stopping. In another moment, they were moving again, Severus led Louisa up a short flight of steps. She felt a warm blast of air as she moved indoors and, closed into their destination at last, the blindfold was removed.

The entrance hall was dilapidated almost beyond imagining, but Louisa felt a swell of recognition. She was bombarded by memories. Mrs. Black's booming, welcoming voice, hearing Narcissa's laughter from the next room, the embarrassment of walking in on Bellatrix and Rodolphus in a heated embrace. The Blacks had hosted many gatherings, and, Louisa guessed, she and Severus had probably been to every one of them.

"Severus, this is -"she began.

"I know," he interrupted gruffly, "Keep your voice down." He explained what he could. She had to know about the Order, but that, he decided, was all. A door opened at the far end of the hall. The man who emerged from it would have been unrecognizable were it not for the frequency of his appearances in the previous year's newspapers. Standing before her, he looked less deranged, but no less angry at the unexpected intrusion. Severus strode over to him and they conversed in hushed, biting tones, looking back at her frequently.

In the end, Louisa found herself seated by her husband at the dingy remains of the Black family kitchen table. "The rest will be here soon," Severus had informed her. He waited until Sirius was distracted before whispering, his breath hot by her ear, "Moody will be here." He made as though to move away again before seeing the helpless horror on her face and thinking better of it. He had grown too accustomed to the offense of Moody's presence and had nearly forgotten the alarm that he too had first felt when the aged Auror had been reintroduced into his life. Against his better judgment, forcing himself to think of Louisa as simply his friend's awkward sister, he reached across the gap between them and gave her hand a brusque squeeze that he hoped was comforting. Moments later, his fingers could still feel the phantom of her warm hand in his.

In a short time, the room began to fill. Some faces were unfamiliar, some she remembered from Hogwarts. She felt more than saw Moody enter. Severus watched her carefully. She remained absolutely still, her gaze fixed on the wall ahead of her. He saw the baffled looks the others gave her and the gruff disdain with which Moody regarded her. But she barely acknowledged them as they decided her fate. Severus was the only one who could see the faint tremble of her lower lip that betrayed her inner torment. He knew that she could have cared less about the others, it was being in the room with the last man her brother had seen, the same man who had sent him to his death that tore at her. It was the same pain that he felt whenever he remembered his old friend.

In the end, she agreed to be relocated to Hogwarts, hidden from the world, but safe. The only words she had spoken were when she had taken the Unbreakable Vow to bind her to secrecy about the Order and its business.

The meeting ended and Severus led her upstairs to the room where she would spend the next nights until a room could be prepared at Hogwarts. He led her in to the tiny, dusty room, the only one still available. She stood in the middle of the room, still and silent. He finally approached her, placing his hand at the small of her back. She turned to him, tears dampened her cheeks.

"That was awful," she said simply. He could have laughed, it was such an understatement.

He allowed himself to embrace her, to let his arms crush her against him, almost willing her to be comforted. He allowed one of his hands to entangle itself in her dark hair. When she pulled back to look at him, he allowed himself to lower his lips to hers. He couldn't help that her arms fit so well around his shoulders or that the press of her body was so warm and soft against his.

She had been so receptive that night, so much in need of feeling something normal and human, that he didn't bother to wonder if he had taken advantage of her in her distress.

She remained at Grimmauld place for another week. Severus returned to Spinner's End. She tried to keep to herself, only venturing downstairs for meals. Remus Lupin had joined the small party of lodgers at the aging residence. Being around him and Sirius again made Louisa feel strangely childish. She remembered them from Hogwarts, of course, though Sirius had made more of an impression on her than the quiet, bookish Lupin. She wondered idly if he realized their family connection – that the Rosiers and Blacks were linked by ties of blood and marriage, or that her aunt's name was written in gold thread on the Black family tree. She easily dismissed the idea. Sirius was a notorious blood traitor – he would not have relished such connections.

During their last years at school, she had had a few late night conversations with Regulus, who had also found the creaky, haunted castle hard to sleep in. And so she had heard firsthand how arrogant and abrasive Sirius could be, not to mention the stories her husband had told her. In their few moments together, she had tried sincerely to see a hint of Regulus in him, though he had been prematurely aged by Azkaban, but saw nothing. Regulus had once told her that he, the product of complicated, incestuous intermarriages, felt doomed to madness. In the presence of the angry, embittered, distracted Sirius Black, she wondered at the truth behind his brother's premonition.

She had always thought Regulus' betrayal had been foolish, and his subsequent death needless, but she had always remembered the ferocity and determination in his eyes when the Dark Lord finally dispatched him, as though the destiny that had manifested itself for him was his own creation. She wondered what Sirius would think if he knew she had seen his brother die.

She thought a lot about the old days, the old group there. Every room held memories of moments she had spent the last years pretending she had never been a part of, no matter how innocent some of them had been. She wondered if the aged house had the same effect on her husband.

Severus visited her one night, arriving conveniently after Molly Weasley had served dinner. They found themselves alone in the dank parlour after the other had retired.

"This house," she began after a long silence, "it makes me miss…so much."

He nodded, but said nothing.

Another night had seen him arrive again after dinner had been cleared. The house was exceptionally full that night and the uneasy tension during the evening meal had been enough to alert Louisa to the impending Order meeting and she secluded herself upstairs before giving her hosts the opportunity to order her away.

Two hours later, a knock on her door woke her from boredom-induced sleep. In a moment, Severus and Lupin had entered the small room. She noted his apparent unease at the sandy-haired wizard's presence.

It was Lupin who spoke first.

"Mrs. Snape," he spoke haltingly, the trepidation in his voice was obvious, "we—the Order—need to know if you might be carrying with you any photographs of known Death Eaters or associates of Death Eaters."

Her brow furrowed instantly. Severus remained silent, but the working of the muscles in his jaw was enough to tell Louisa that he was troubled by the scene before him.

"Why?"

"The Aurors just need to make some identifications," Lupin's tone was gentle, reasoning, "They just need to ask some questions."

She looked at her husband, "Who?"

He swallowed, raising his eyes to hers, "Narcissa and Avery."

He'd known that there was nothing for her to like in this news, but seeing her tremble with the thought of aiding the Aurors inspired a swell of guilt in him.

When she finally spoke, her voice was quiet and pleading, "You know Narcissa has nothing to do with any of this. And Avery…Severus, really."

His head shook slightly, "You haven't seen what he's capable of."

"Narcissa never even took the Mark."

He remained expressionless. The thought of betraying those she had once held so dearly made her breathing grow labored with panic.

"Severus, how far will you let this go? Would you let them send an innocent woman to Azkaban? And what will happen to us then?"

"Your assistance gives you immunity," Lupin interjected.

"Then you would sacrifice their safety for ours?" she continued, "Does that make you a better man?"

For a moment, Severus' vision was blurred by fury and indignation. "You can't even begin to imagine what they've done, what I've seen them do. You took the Mark, but what else did you ever have to do to prove your loyalty?" his voice was low and dangerous, Lupin looked away uncomfortably, "Help us or don't, but don't fool yourself that our _dear friends_ were innocents."

She maintained her cool façade, but she could see the same strange, haunted quality in her husband's eyes that she saw on that Halloween night so many years ago and it made something bitter twist in her stomach.

"And what atrocities to you suppose Cissy to be capable of? Is it not true that the only possibility of her guilt comes from her unfortunate choice of a husband?" she glowered, continuing without giving him a chance to reply, "Accio album." A somber, black, leather-bound volume emerged from her suitcases and flew to her waiting hands. Lupin could see the words "_Our Wedding_" embossed in silver on its front.

She thrust the book into her husband's hands, "I'm glad to know where your loyalties truly lie."

Lupin half expected the door to slam behind them as he and Severus exited onto the landing, but instead it clicked softly shut.

Severus sat quietly as the Order members examined his wedding photos. He didn't need to see them to know what they looked like. He could imagine well enough the discomfited bride and groom, still internally reeling from recent losses and finding it difficult to smile. He could imagine the haughty Lucius, beautiful, smiling Narcissa, Bellatrix, slightly manic even before her prison sentence, Rudolphus, Avery, the Carrows, Nott, Mulciber, MacNair, Augustus, Barty, all figures that could only increase the Order's disdain for him.

He sighed, feeling a sudden overwhelming fatigue. Thirty-five years of life had blurred the lines of amity and animosity beyond recognition. He had traded his friendship with Lily for these new alliances. Lily had betrayed him with Potter; he had betrayed his circle to the Order. And tonight he had betrayed Louisa's trust.

But later, after the Order members had dispersed, he had gone back to her room and she had forgiven him. She always did. As Severus lowered himself into bed in her musty chamber, snaking an arm around her waist, pressing her back to his front, and vowing to wake up exceptionally early in order to sneak out unseen, he wondered at the incredible nature of forgiveness. He knew himself to be hardly deserving of it, but the absolution that Albus gave him, that she gave him, had somehow become the only thing that kept him alive, even now. And he knew that he had forgiven Lily for her abandonment of him, even if she had never forgiven him for his dalliances in the dark arts and pureblood politics. The strange idea that he had this trait in common with Albus and Louisa made something swell in his chest and gave him hope.

She saw Moody once more before she left for Hogwarts. Some cruel twist of fate had resulted in her being left alone with him, Lupin, Tonks, and Severus, in anticipation of the Order meeting that would give her a final briefing on her new life.

Louisa's silence was viciously enforced as she bit the inside of her cheek almost to the point of bleeding. The awkward silence was finally broken when Moody offered a gruff, apologetic, "Guess you remember me, eh?"

Her eyes snapped up to his, repressed anger made her breathing heavy but a stern, worried look from Severus kept her silent. She knew how disliked he was, there was no sense in making his position worse. She returned her gaze to the folded hands in her lap.

"I'm sorry about your brother," she knew he was trying to mend fences, as though she was capable of forgiving him, "but it was him or me, to be sure."

There was a roaring in her ears then, her right hand jerked almost of its own volition to the wand concealed in her cloak before it was intercepted by Severus who stilled it in a vise-like grip.

"That will be quite enough, Moody," he growled on her behalf.

She left for Hogwarts the next day.


	7. The Phantom Inside

The Loss of Ours: Chapter 6

By Polexia Aphrodite

Notes: Reviews are lovely. Thanks, everybody.

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**1995-96:**

She had moved into the ancient castle without incident. She stayed in her husband's quarters and found a strange thrill in being in the private rooms of the Slytherin Head of House. She was confined to their rooms, even more so with the onset of the school term, when it became imperative to hide her presence from the officious Delores Umbridge.

Louisa never protested to the arrangement. The few moments she had spent in the halls of Hogwarts had only reminded her of her youth, of Regulus, who had died, of Barty, now a hollow shell of a human in Azkaban, of Evan and Wilkes, who had also died, and of Severus as he had been then, tall and lanky and whispering conspiratorially with Lily Evans.

As the term progressed, she saw little of him, despite living in his quarters. He regulated himself to his classroom and his office. They shared a bed, but he kept his back to her. But there were still nights when her proximity became too tempting and he couldn't resist turning her to face him in the dark, waking her with gentle, exploratory strokes of his hand. She was always receptive, and a part of him welcomed the way she reached for him sleepily as he nuzzled the tender base of her neck. She almost never questioned him afterwards, when he remembered himself, his past, and, gathering a pillow and blanket, relocated to the sofa in his small parlour.

"Why do you do this?" she had asked him one night.

He had stopped, halfway to the door, still half-dressed and clutching his pillow.

"Do what?" he barked, finding comfort in irritation.

"Run away like this."

"I…" he trailed off, unsure if a way to coherently explain why he couldn't stand being near her during those vulnerable, impressionable, post-sex moments when he could so easily convince himself that what he felt real affection for her, despite the reasonable impossibility inherent in the very idea.

"It is because of her? That girl who married Potter?" Louisa knew it was partially cowardice that prevented her from saying her name, which she knew perfectly well, but her Slytherin instincts also recognized the significance in reminding her husband about the truth of Lily's ultimate alliances.

Severus swallowed and looked away, "I don't know what you're talking about."

"I'm not stupid, Severus. Nor have I ever been."

He looked back at her. She lit the candle on the bedside table with a slight movement of her wand. His eyes narrowed, wondering how much she had really guessed.

"If you go in that parlour," she continued, "I'll sleep on the floor next to you."

"Don't be ridiculous."

"Then stay here so we can both be comfortable."

Their eyes were locked together. She could feel him tentatively probing the outer edges of her mind and lowered her defences. If he truly wanted to see her thoughts, she would let him. He understood her gesture of permission, though her apparent foolishness confused him. He delved deeper, seeing scenes from his own memory, of himself and Lily. He had never noticed that she had been so aware of them. Inside her consciousness, he felt what she felt for him, her confusion, her frustration, her bitter anger, and, neatly hidden beneath, a deeply felt affection. He pulled back. Knowing beyond doubt that she cared warmed him through.

"Come back to bed," her voice was soft, almost shy.

He knew that she was still unclothed under the cream-coloured sheets and he knew that the temptation to lose himself with her again might recur and the confirmation of her affection somehow left him feeling even more defenceless, but he returned to the bed anyway. She reached for his hand and he took it, reflexively tightening his grip as he felt how chilled her fingers were. Her hands had been perpetually cold since she moved into the dungeons with him. When she finally spoke, her voice was quiet, but determined.

"You don't have to…whatever you felt for her, you don't have to feel it for me. I wouldn't ask you to. I know it's not very Slytherin to show mercy, but please…do try to remember what I feel for you, what I can't help feeling, and how dearly I have already suffered for it."

She turned to him. He nodded slightly, not meeting her gaze, his brow furrowed. Another wave of her wand extinguished the candle at her side. She slid down under the covers, pulling the hand that he still held towards her, gently leading him to wrap his arms around her in the dark.

As the months wore on and the new year dawned, Severus found himself increasingly preoccupied with his classes, avoiding Umbridge's maneuverings, and teaching the damnably thick-headed Potter Occlumency. It was only two days after his thirty-sixth birthday (which came and went blissfully uncelebrated as per his wishes) that the Azkaban escape was reported. His function within the Order was expanded exponentially as the Death Eater meetings were called more and more frequently.

Louisa asked had asked him why her Mark never burned, as his did. He hadn't wanted to wound her pride by revealing that the Dark Lord thought her only useful only in her conjugal role, an attractive, pureblood wife to lend respectability to her half-blooded husband, though He recognized that her influence as the only surviving relative of the martyred Evan Rosier could yet play some role. Ultimately, he learned, her Mark had only been a result of one of the Dark Lord's whims to prove one of his follower's loyalties. Though Severus sensed that she felt some nonsensical frustration at her uselessness, he could have kissed the Dark Lord himself when he learned that Louisa would be protected.

The spring evening when Severus had discovered Potter violating his penseive was arguably one of the worst of the year. The idea that Potter had, of all his memories, seen _that_ one was infuriating, but it was the reminder of what the memory contained that he was left with once Potter had been shouted out of the room.

Though he had replayed the memory in his head over and over, his hazy mind's eye had neglected to remember the small details that the objective pensieve collected: the oddly intrigued way Lily had looked at Potter, hidden under her outward anger, and the secret smile at his joking that she had tried to conceal. _It doesn't matter_ he told himself, and repeated his mantra, despite the prickling sensation of betrayal in the back of his mind, _Always. Always._

That spring also brought the return of invitations to the Malfoy estate for the first time in fifteen years. Louisa had always thought that a return to their old lives would happen, but when her husband handed her the gilt note requesting their presence at a celebration for the return of the Azkaban escapees, her heart dropped to her stomach. In the days leading up to their reentry into Death Eater society, Severus had helped her sharpen her Occlumency skills so that she might protect the Order.

In the end, Louisa had been sorely disappointed. The meeting had been full of familiar faces, but each was more somber and morose than the next. The undercurrent of dangerous frustration and determination was palpable. In that new group of age-lined faces, the wild days when a strictly ordered meeting had been followed by late nights and early mornings of raucous laughter, freely flowing and outrageously expensive elf-made wine, and decadently loose morals, seemed gone forever. Narcissa's once-generous smiles no longer reached her eyes. Bellatrix's mere pureblood fervor had blossomed into utter madness. Lucius' teasing lasciviousness had been replaced by cold malice.

Returning to Hogwarts late that night, Severus and Louisa were completely silent and they sank to sleep without a single word.

Severus had alerted the Order to the attack on the Department of Mysteries that June. He had spent the rest of the night in his office grading his students' final essays, despite the fact that he had been put on probation. He was decidedly disinclined to follow Delores Umbridges' arbitrary rulemaking. Louisa had flooed in at midnight, placing a hand on his shoulder and asking him if he was alright. He most certainly was not. His entire body hummed with anticipation. He could only guess at what was happening; the Dark Lord had only given him vague ideas. It would be hours before he would know how the battle had gone, if Potter would be safe and his covenant kept. But he told his wife that he was quite well and sent her back through the floo to their rooms.

Hours later, he finally found himself lying in bed, torturously awake in the dark next to her sleeping form. He knew that the world would soon know that the Dark Lord had returned and his loyalties would be inescapably open to question once more. It was past four when his wearied mind, to tired and incoherent to stay awake any longer, finally rested.


	8. Only Counting Doubts

The Loss of Ours: Chapter 7

By Polexia Aphrodite

Notes: Thanks so much to those who have reviewed! Reviews really do help motivate me to turn all my half-finished scenes and notes into an actual story. I haven't added to this in a long time and I'm feeling a little rusty, so let me know what you think.

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**Summer, 1996:**

In the morning, Sirius was dead. Umbridge was gone. Lucius was in Azkaban. The Dark Lord had returned.

"How did he die?" Louisa had asked her husband.

"Bella," his brow was creased, his eyes avoided hers.

"He was tortured?"

"No," he sighed, "she used the Killing Curse."

Louisa shrugged, "He was lucky."

After Hogwarts had been vacated of students at the end of term, the Order met again, finding a solace in the school due to the presumed lack of security at Grimmauld Place.

Severus had led her silently to the staff room. She walked beside him. Before their final entrance, he had told her to "tell them what they wanted." She hadn't known what he meant at the time.

They were separated. Dumbledore, Moody and McGonagall led Severus into an adjoining classroom. Tonks, Lupin and Louisa formed a somber circle around one of the chamber's three heavy oak tables.

None of them spoke. The blue-purple swellings under Remus' eyes, his deepened frown lines, and his unkempt, unwashed hair provided the physical manifestations of the past weeks' inner torment. Louisa watched as Tonks watched him, her concern evident in her expression. Her hair was long, a deep, mournful blue that hung past her shoulders.

Lupin exhaled slowly. "Mrs. Snape, we've been asked to ask you some questions."

His hand slid across the table towards her, pushing a small vial of clear liquid.

"I have nothing to hide," she frowned, her tone was indignant.

"I'm afraid we have no choice."

She sulked for a moment, but knew to expect no less than injustice from Aurors. She unscrewed the bottle's lid, using the attached eyedropper to squeeze three drops onto her tongue. After a moment, the questions began. Tonks pulled out a pad of paper to transcribe the conversation.

"What is your name?"

"Louisa Alberta Rosier Snape"

"How old are you?"

"Thirty-five"

"How long have you been married to Severus Snape?"

"Fifteen years"

"Have you ever seen him use an Unforgivable Curse?"

"Yes. Cruciatus," Tonks' left eyebrow shot up, and Louisa continued emphatically, "_Only_ Cruciatus."

"Do you believe he has used the Killing Curse?"

Louisa hesitated, struggling against the potion and her own awareness of the probability, "I believe that it's possible."

"Have you ever used an Unforgivable?"

"Yes. Cruciatus."

The Dark Lord had tested her when she took the Mark, as he tested all his followers. She could still hear her brother's anguished cries as he writhed under the searing pain her own wand had caused.

"How many of the Dark Lord's followers have you been romantically or sexually involved with?"

The scratching of Tonks' quill paused.

"That's not…" Louis began before the potion stopped her, "How is that relevant?"

"It may give us an indication of your past loyalties, Mrs. Snape," Lupin rubbed his temple, his voice was tired but oddly bitter, "We can't trust you without full disclosure."

She inhaled deeply. There was Barty, who she'd finally given permission to one warm summer night. Their union had been awkward, uncomfortable and blessedly brief.

Then there was Regulus, who had talked to her about loneliness on late nights, who had kissed her and run his hands across her clothed body in the moonlit common room, and who she might have loved if he had lived.

There was Lucius, who had seduced her once in the unbearably cold and isolated early years of her marriage. It was her greatest moment of weakness and she hated that Severus knew, that Lucius, for whom sex was power, had told him. Severus had forgiven her impassively, externally nonchalant but secretly erupting with jealousy and blinding frustration.

Then there was Severus.

She listed them all coolly.

"When did you last attend a gathering of Death Eaters?"

"In the spring. I don't believe it was a secret," she replied archly.

"Do you believe that Severus Snape is loyal to the Order of the Pheonix?"

She thought for a moment, "Yes."

The interview continued for a seemingly interminable half an hour. By the end, they had asked every conceivable question about her and her husband's allegiances, activities, and personal lives. When Severus, Moody and Dumbledore reemerged, his visible exhaustion seemed to match hers.

Alone again in their quarters, he walked to his desk, aimlessly shuffling papers, trying to regain normalcy. She had come up to him from behind, wrapping her arms around his waist, her cheek pressed into the valley between his shoulder blades. He turned, swinging an arm over her head and around her shoulders. For a moment, she looked like Evan's little sister again, impossibly short and wanting only reassurance and comfort.

He smirked, his fingers brushing her hair, "We'll survive."

The corners of her lips curled upwards and the small smile made the air rush out of his lungs inexplicably. She retreated into their bedroom.

In solitude, his mind wandered to his interrogation. He knew that he had presented himself well, even through the Veritaserum. Moody had been impressed. He wondered how Louisa had done. Both Lupin and Tonks had become self absorbed enough as to be oblivious to the problems of others. He seriously doubted their efficacy as inquisitors.

Lupin. Severus couldn't bear the thought of working with him. They were the last remnants of those days at Hogwarts. Lupin was surely the only person aside from Dumbledore who could guess at what Lily had truly meant to him.

What she had meant to him. But what had he meant to her? Not half as much as Potter had, apparently. But if Severus had never indulged his childish inclination for mimicking the politics of his

Slytherin acquaintances, if he had never given her a reason to embrace Potter, if he had never married Louisa, if he and Lily were still together, would they have even been happy?

He wanted so desperately to think that they would have been.


	9. Turn Bad Into Good Again

The Loss of Ours: Chapter 8

By Polexia Aphrodite

Notes: I love writing this. Hope you all like it too. Either way, please review!

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**July, 1996:**

The summer was quickly becoming unbearably warm in the antiquated castle. Severus was to leave Hogwarts, as per the Dark Lord's wishes. His absence at the Department of Mysteries had not gone unnoticed and he needed to distance himself temporarily from Hogwarts and Dumbledore.

Louisa had discovered him packing in their bedroom at twilight, methodically filling an opened suitcase resting on the bed. Though it was going on nine in the evening, the sky outside was still a clear, deep cerulean blue. Low, amber sunlight spread lazy shadows across the floor. He was in his shirtsleeves, his cuffs uncharacteristically rolled up to the elbow in a futile attempt to escape the room's stuffiness.

"Are we leaving?" she tried to keep the excitement out of her voice. She knew that Severus considered Hogwarts to be his home, but it had never been hers.

Severus winced at her words. It was a moment he had been dreading all afternoon, since his earlier meeting with Dumbledore. He sometimes felt that the better part of his life at Hogwarts was spent either attempting to instruct the un-instructable or embroiled in torturously embarrassing and exposing conversations in the Headmaster's office. Today's discussion had been one of the worst.

"_I'm_ leaving," he began, trying to sound authoritative, "You will remain here."

"Here? At Hogwarts?" her stomach lurched at the unwelcome surprise, "Is that what the Dark Lord wants?"

"No," he snapped the suitcase closed, "It's what Albus wants."

Her brow furrowed, "Albus?"

He sighed, keeping his eyes fixed on his suitcase. He knew he was fidgeting but resisted the urge to shove his hands in his pockets for fear of looking as childishly stupid as he felt.

"The Order is concerned that a plot to free Lucius is being formed"

He looked up at her long enough to see her shake her head in confusion. He inhaled deeply, trying to fill his lungs, which felt on the verge of stifling collapse, and continued.

"Apparently you told them about your…connection to Lucius. They're concerned you might try to aid in his escape."

Her mouth opened in shocked outrage. He stared at the closed suitcase.

Her head turned away from him sharply, a flush, either from anger or embarrassment, rapidly spreading across her face and chest. Her breathing grew heavy. She wanted to throw something, to beat her fists against something, to scream or cry or shout.

"Can we never escape the mistakes of our past?" she cried, her strangled voice revealed the choking, unreleased sob that had built in her throat.

He snorted, his lips twisting into a grim smirk. How often he had wondered the exact same thing.

At the slight noise, she turned back to him, as if reminded of his presence. Her chest constricted to see him then, without the physical armor of his jacket and robes and so clearly avoiding her gaze.

"Severus," she reached out an hand to touch him. He shook her off, unrolling his sleeves with unusual vigor. In another moment, he had shrugged his jacket on, swung his heavy, black robes around his shoulders and taken the suitcase in his hand.

He was moving towards the door when she stopped him again. She had only to place her hand on his arm to stop him, to make him turn and look at her. He wondered if his wordless compliance was a sign that he had wanted her to interfere in his departure.

Panic was written plainly across her expression. Her fingers curled around his elbow.

"Please…don't…," she paused, trying to still the thoughts tumbling through her mind, "Do you forgive me?"

His brow creased. She had never cared about his forgiveness before, though he had surreptitiously cared about hers. Even when the affair had actually happened, neither of them had discussed it. She had apologized and he had believed in her contrition, but she had never asked for his forgiveness.

"Does it matter if I forgive you?" he asked sharply in the same tone he reserved for disobedient students. Though he knew it was cruel, he was testing her, wondering how she would react.

She stepped forward, leaning her forehead against his upper arm. Her eyes closed, her brow still knitted. He couldn't see her face, but he didn't think she was crying. He hoped she wasn't.

"Yes," she whispered.

His entire body felt numb, though he didn't know why. He swallowed, his jaw clenched unconsciously.

"Then I do."

He wanted to drop the valise to the floor, throw his arms around her, carry her into their bedroom and pretend the world didn't exist. But he didn't.

"We'll be in touch," he barked, hoping that gruffness would be enough to suppress the longing building in his chest. It wasn't.

And then he was gone.

He went to Spinner's End. It was smaller, and more manageable than the Rosier Estate, he had reasoned. To his never-ending dismay, he had been greeted by Peter Pettigrew. Though Pettigrew feigned obedience and near-servitude, Severus knew he was being spied on. He also knew that Pettigrew secretly believed in his own superiority, believing that his pure blood trumped the dwindling favor bestowed on Severus by the Dark Lord.

Within only days of his relocation, he had played the host for Narcissa and Bellatrix. He had known what Draco was assigned to do. Though his mind screamed at him to spurn them both and let Draco take his punishment, he had known that, in that moment, his position hung by a thread. And his work was more important than his life. So he had taken the vow.

Severus returned to the castle late one August night after receiving an emergency owl from McGonagall. When he arrived at the castle, he had been surprised to see Louisa gathered with the other assorted staff members who stayed at Hogwarts over the summer and had congregated, still dressed in their pyjamas, in the castle's entrance hall. As he passed them on the way to Dumbledore's office, he had gestured that Louisa should follow him.

Though they said nothing, his hand rested at the small of her back as they walked, just barely feeling the curve of her back through the gossamer fabric of her nightgown.

Inside the Headmaster's office, Severus had evaluated the injury caused to Dumbledore's hand by the cursed ring and dispatched Louisa for potions ingredients. After she returned successfully, he had dismissed her, needing to speak to Albus privately.

It was then that Severus had consented to killing Albus Dumbledore. He could not have denied him, this man who had given him his life back, to whom he owed what little he had earned back.

He had returned to his chambers quietly. Louisa had been seated in their small parlour, but said nothing, knowing intuitively that he needed distance.

They sat together in silence for a long while. It was past one in the morning when Severus rose, extended a hand to Louisa and led her to their bedroom.

Exhaustion and lack of practice over the past weeks made their coupling unusually abbreviated, but afterwards, curled against each other in the darkness, in spite of the his overall sense of impending doom, Severus had never felt so whole.


	10. With Closed Eyes

The Loss of Ours: Chapter 9

By Polexia Aphrodite

Notes: The "Aurora" mentioned in the beginning is Aurora Sinistra. Thanks to all those who have been reading and reviewing. Special thanks go to Mark Darcy, who kindly beta-read this chapter for me.

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**Late August, 1996:**

The warmth of summer had lasted until the end of the month. Days before the weather snapped into the chilly, brisk temperatures of autumn, Severus had woken in the early, still-dark hours of the morning to the press of Louisa's lips against his collarbone.

Opening his eyes, he struggled against the indigo ambient light in the room to see the dark outline of her head against his shoulder. Her hand reached up, her fingers traced up his the side of his neck, pushing into his hair. The cool pads of her fingers against the skin of his scalp made his eyes close involuntarily and a soft sigh escape his lips.

She smiled against his chest, pressing her body fully against the side of his. She shifted, meeting her mouth to his neck, jawbone, and lips. Her hand moved lower, sliding under the cool, beige sheets. Need surged within him as he moved against her strokes. By the time her hips finally straddled his, he was overwhelmed.

Later, as he recovered, she rose slightly, an outstretched elbow and a hand, gleaming white against her dark hair, supported her head. She was silent for a long while, her eyes fixed on the rising and falling of his chest, waiting for his breathing to calm.

"Why didn't you tell me you got the Defence post?"

His head turned to face her, but the room was too dark to make out her features clearly.

"How do you know about that?"

"Aurora told me"

He frowned, "For a Slytherin, she's always been disturbingly candid."

"Why didn't you tell me?" she repeated quietly.

"It doesn't—," he hesitated, his expression growing tense, "You know as well as I do what that position means."

She shifted, her face turned away from his. The inability to see her reaction made frustration swell in his chest. He sensed his pupils dilate as he strained against the room's shadows, needing to see her face.

"You're leaving Hogwarts?" her voice was barely audible.

"I can't…I can't say. Not for certain."

She turned back to him, "Yes, you can. You know what's coming. Why aren't you telling me?"

He swallowed, soft light from the room's only window illuminated her face. But, now that he had her gaze fixed on him, he found himself unable to meet it.

He considered each word as it left his mouth to hang in the air between them, "It's just better that you don't know. I wish I didn't."

He heard her sigh, felt her arms circle his shoulders, sensed his arms coil around her bare back. He knew what it meant, that she understood, and that she wouldn't leave.

**January, 1997**:

Severus' concern for Draco's soul and continued innocence was the definition of superficiality. Were it not for Dumbledore's insistence, he would have been content to let history unfold. The only favors the elder Malfoy had ever performed for him had left him socially powerful, but it had lost him Lily, his self-respect, and his dignity. But he _had_ tried to help Draco.

When he had tried and failed to consult Draco on the boy's plans after Slughorn's Christmas party, Louisa had asked for the chance to try deciphering his strategy.

"You? Why?" Severus had asked.

She had shrugged noncommittally.

"I—I know his mother. He might just feel more comfortable…," she waved her hand in the air, hoping that he would infer an appropriate conclusion to her sentence that she herself could not find.

He nodded, but she could see his jaw clench and unclench.

"You think he'll talk to you because you're pureblooded."

She shifted uncomfortably.

"You know," she began, "it's just how he was raised."

A single dark eyebrow climbed upward.

"And how you were raised, I would imagine," his voice was soft. His eyes met hers without any discernable expression.

She stalled, licking her lips slowly. He stepped closer, bending to place his mouth near her left ear.

"Think your blood's better than mine, Mrs. Snape?"

She could feel her pulse quicken, her heart rate increase.

_Of course it is,_ she could hear Evan's response as though it were him next to her, _The ancient Rosier bloodline would put any half-breed to shame._

Her head shook almost involuntarily, willing the offending thought away despite knowing that it was deeply, irreversibly ingrained in her conscious and unconscious mind.

She couldn't meet his penetrating gaze, but sensed him smirk slightly.

"Just as I thought," his tone was indiscernible, "but I suppose it's just how you were raised."

She raised her eyes to his then.

"Severus, it doesn't—that doesn't change anything. I can still-"

"I have a class," he interrupted with a brusque glance at his timepiece, "Talk to the boy. Doubt you'll have much luck though."

He was right.

By early spring, Louisa found herself feeling uncommonly happy. She knew that something was coming, her husband's constantly increasing attitudes of soberness and what seemed to be near-depression told her as much. But she had found a friend in Aurora Sinistra and, since Umbridge's departure had allowed her to move freely about the school, she had undertaken reasonably fulfilling work as Madam Pince's assistant in the library.

And there was something else. Something was different in the way Severus reacted to her. Gradually, in the privacy of their apartments, she was surprised to find him warming to her presence. He was suddenly more apt to ask her opinion on any number of subjects. She would find him pressing against her as they drifted to sleep, knowing that his gesture wasn't an effort to satisfy an uncontrollable sexual impulse, but an attempt to find human contact. After sixteen years, she was coming to feel that she had a husband.

**April, 1997**:

_Perhaps I have changed my mind._

Walking with Dumbledore on Hogwarts' extensive grounds had tested the limits of Severus' ability to control his temper.

The truth was, he had had second thoughts. Those few moments when he had let himself seduce or be seduced by Louisa, had let himself hold her, had noticed her perfume or felt his heart leap at the sight of one of her rare, true smiles or barely suppressed a chuckle at one of her wry attempts at humour, they were all moments of weakness that had made him doubt his mission.

It was because of her that he had strange, wrong thoughts about a future in which he wasn't killed by an angry mob after murdering Dumbledore or condemned to die in Azkaban. Her presence inspired the dreams that tormented him with visions of undeserved happiness, warmth, and comfort that spawned sleepless nights.

He didn't realise how weak he had become until later that night, when he and Dumbledore sat alone in the Headmaster's office. Louisa had made him soft. She had made him into a man whose commitment could be questioned; a man whose commitment to _Lily _could be questioned.

He decided in that office that he would not let himself be tempted into forgetting her again. He would keep loving Lily. It was all he could trust himself to do.

_Always._

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Note: The last scene takes place during the flashback scenes in _The Prince's Tale_ in Deathly Hallows. The italicized dialogue has been taken from the original text.


	11. Sorrow or Inspiration

The Loss of Ours: Chapter 10

By Polexia Aphrodite

Notes: Thanks to all those who have read and reviewed! As always, reviews are immensely influential in getting me inspired enough to finish this thing.

* * *

**June 1997**:

Her later memories of the night of Dumbledore's death would be an unfocused jumble of images. Shouting orders to the Slytherin prefects. Desperately running up and down charmed stairways to get to the Ravenclaw common room. Running past McGonagall in the corridor on her way to Hufflepuff. Hearing the increasingly loud pops of spells. Rabastan LeStrange grabbing her roughly by the arm as she skidded around a corner in her continuing effort to reach Ravenclaw. Rabastan pulling her through the halls of Hogwarts until they were outside and a lukewarm, June breeze was touching her skin. The glow of Hagrid's burning cabin belching smoke into the dark sky. Apparating to the Rosier Estate only to find it empty. And then knowing intuitively where he was and apparating once more.

When Louisa entered Spinner's End, the tiny house was quiet. She saw Draco first.

The boy's flaxen hair was messily arranged, as though he had tried to repair it without a mirror. Fear was plain in his eyes.

He rushed up to her the moment she entered.

"He says I can't go home," his voice was trembling but accusatory, "What the hell am I supposed to do?"

Her hand rose to touch his shoulder in an attempt at comfort.

"There's a spare room upstairs on the left. Linens are in the closet at the end of the hall," her voice was automatic, unthinking, "Get some sleep. We'll contact your mother in the morning."

He frowned, childishly unready for his night of adventure to be over, but retreated up to bed nonetheless.

Severus sat on the sofa, his face buried in his hands, muffling his voice, "Do you hate me?"

She moved to stand next to him, but hesitated to touch him.

"Have you given me any reason to?"

He looked up at her in consternation.

"I've killed Albus Dumbledore. One of the greatest wizards of the age. The Order's greatest hope to defeat the Dark Lord," his tone was condescending, but she could hear the waver of self-loathing that his abrasiveness cloaked.

Her brows were knitted. She knelt before him, taking his tear-dampened hands in hers.

She didn't think. She knew what she had to say, and what he had to hear. Her eyes were fixed on his, unflinching.

"I know you. You are not this thing. You are more than what you've done."

It was a benediction that made his entire body feel weak. She helped him lie back on the sofa, rearranging pillows under his head and summoning a blanket. In another moment he was asleep.

He didn't know why exactly he had gone back to Grimmauld Place that summer, mere days after becoming the most wanted man in wizarding Britain. Part of him had secretly hoped that he would be greeted by the Order, arrested, and sentenced to die in Azkaban in short order. But he had found the house dark and silent and he had found himself rummaging shamelessly through Sirius' belongings. It was then that he found the picture; that damned, stupid picture that made him cry harder than he had since she died.

Tearing the photo as tears streamed down his face and his breathing became erratic, ragged sobs, knowing that he would take the memento, he hated himself. He hated himself for who he was in that moment, and he hated Lily for making him that person. That _Snivellus_.

In August, he was appointed as his victim's replacement as the head of Hogwarts. In all of his youthful fantasies about power and control, he had never dreamed of being headmaster and the unearned promotion both shamed and irritated him.

Louisa returned to the school with him, where she faithfully socialized with the grotesque Carrows, just as he asked her to.

Shortly after the beginning of the term that September, it quickly became apparent that Headmaster Snape's life would be no easier than Professor Snape's had, despite the increase in authority. With the exception of most of the Slytherin House, the students regarded him with even more apprehension, though the alleged members of the infamous "Dumbledore's Army" were more apt to approach him with bald-faced defiance.

The staff, particularly McGonagall, shared their students' fear and contempt, remaining unbearably silent in his presence and refusing to honor even the most innocuous policy changes.

On a brisk October night, Severus found himself lying under the more sumptuous down bedding of the Headmaster's chamber, Louisa next to him.

"This is unbearable," he said expressionlessly, his words piercing the late-night darkness.

She smiled, but her eyes glistened in the dim ambient light.

"We'll survive."

He couldn't look at her.

After a succession of torturous weeks spent struggling to obtain some semblance of clout in his new position, the Christmas holiday arrived. The school was nearly emptied, but Severus and Louisa remained. Only days before the holiday itself, Severus received orders to produce the patronus that would lead Harry to the sword of Godric Gryffindor.

He had hidden it under the ice, honoring Dumbledore's portrait's command that it should be obtained only with difficulty and valor.

Standing in the blue-black gloom of the forest, Severus flourished his wand, taking care not to strike any low-hanging tree branches.

He brought to the front of his mind a memory of Lily. It was from their third year. They had been studying in the library and she had laughed at his wry jokes, not yet tinged with bitterness and anger. She bent near him to point out a mistake he had made in his class notes. Their heads had nearly touched and her flame-red hair had brushed the side of his face. Her hand rested on his upper arm and she smelled like lavender.

He cast the Patronus charm. The gaseous, iridescent white cloud that flowed from the tip of his wand should have immediately taken recognizable shape, but it remained amorphous blur conspicuously lighting the dark trees that surrounded him.

He concentrated harder, trying to think of even happier moments he had had with her. In the end, the doe he created was smaller than usual, its tail a touch too long and its snout and ears were strangely extended. In some unrecognized part of his mind, he knew that the Patronus was unnatural, but he knew Potter wouldn't notice and so let it complete its mission.

He carried the torn photograph in his breast pocket. He told himself that it was to keep Lily close to his heart, but it was not only a reminder, but a talisman against foreign invasion.

It was February when Louisa discovered it. He had left it behind after being summoned for a Death Eater meeting and she had come across it, a tiny corner of glossy paper slid between two ancient potions books on his private shelves.

He returned three hours later to find her standing motionlessly in their chambers' parlour, the photo sitting, exposed and accusatory, on his desk. He saw it immediately.

"What does it mean?" she asked quietly.

He swept to the desk, lifting the photograph and sliding it into his pocket.

"It's not important."

"Severus—"

She stepped towards him.

"It doesn't concern you."

Her fingers tightened around his upper arm, pulling him to face her.

Her voice was raised, "It _does. _You know it does."

"Why should you care?" he spat, "We are bound by a legally and magically binding contract, nothing more. We're not _in love_. Necessity and requirement are the only reasons we're here now."

Her face contorted in silent anguish, her arms doubled around her stomach as though he had struck her. She gave a strangled gasp and cleared her throat noisily in an effort to disguise her subsequent sob. Just looking at her in that moment made his chest hurt and his mind blur. A desperate, unspoken apology boiled in his throat but he said nothing.

He forced himself to meet her plaintive gaze.

"I don't have anyone else," her voice cracked and she cleared her throat again, "You're my family."

In another moment, his arms were around her shaking shoulders and her arms gripped his waist. He didn't apologise that night and he didn't manipulate his wife into granting forgiveness, but he kissed her forehead and spent the night curled on their sofa while she lay, awake and numb, in their bed.


	12. Failures Are Training Ground

The Loss of Ours: Chapter 11

By Polexia Aphrodite

Notes: So, this one took a while to finish. Hopefully it will come a little faster after this. Thanks again to those who have been reading and reviewing.

* * *

**Spring, 1998:**

In his final days at Hogwarts, Severus chose Lily. He had always been stubborn and single-minded and, after realizing that the awkwardness caused by his wife's discovery of Lily's photograph was most likely irreversible, Severus decided to renew his consuming devotion to the woman who had turned him away twenty-two years ago.

There were, of course, some complications with this plan. More than once, Severus had been caught off guard by one of Louisa's sardonic remarks and had once nearly cracked a smile. She had even cajoled him into a forty-five minute debate about the possible use of crushed peony root to counter the effects of asphodel in a Draught of the Living Death. The conversation ended abruptly when Severus, unable to remember a time when he and Lily had had a conversation about potions (outside of the myriad of times when she had complained about Potions homework or copied his), called Louisa's theory preposterous and stormed from the room.

It was May first, May Day, that Severus fled from the castle. In his absence, in the pre-dawn hours in which the Order of the Phoenix assembled and formed a plan of battle against Voldemort, Louisa had risen, dressed, and joined the rest in the Great Hall.

It was there that, for the first time in years, a flash of pain tore through her left forearm. It began at the superficial flesh of the abominable tattoo inscribed there, but quickly became a bone-deep ache, the intensity of which took the breath out of her and nearly made her cry out. She managed to continue for some time like that, surrounded by the preoccupied students and professors of Hogwarts as she stood motionless, crippled by pain. Later, she would only remember the ringing in her ears as the world around her grew dark and she crumpled lifelessly to the floor.

She regained consciousness moments later. Her left sleeve had been pushed up to her elbow and she could feel warm fingers cradling her wrist and tilting the underside of her arm upwards. Her eyes opened and she gazed blearily at a crowd of faces exhibiting various degrees of concern, shock, and suspicion.

After a series of unintelligible arguments, it was Lupin who, placing his hands under her arms, lifted her and half-carried her from the room.

His arm supporting her waist, Lupin led Louisa into an empty classroom. The sounds of their footsteps echoed in the silent, stone chamber.

"I'm sorry," he said, looking at her squarely as he lowered her into a chair and released her, casting a partial-body bind on her before she could react, "but you'll be safer in here anyway."

He turned swiftly and moved toward the door.

"Lup—Remus," she began, finding that her head and hands were still mobile. Louisa looked up at him desperately, her cheeks flushed and hair tumbling messily around her shoulders, "You know he's not as evil as they would all have you believe. Let me go. I can talk sense to him, I can find out what he's planning."

Lupin returned her gaze, his expression was sympathetic but unyielding.

"Please," she began again, "let me help you."

He looked at her intently, but turned and left, the heavy classroom door thudding shut behind him.

Two hours passed. The room filled with the sounds of unseen spells and shouts punctuated by eerie silences. It was during one of these lulls that Lupin returned to find Louisa driven half-wild with nerves, sweat glistening on her brow. It was then that he released the body bind and led her from the room.

Louisa followed the werewolf outside the castle and onto the grounds. He moved quickly and, in her agitation, she matched his speed easily. Their excursion ended in a patch of outlying trees near the edge of the Forbidden Forest. There, among the trees, she saw her husband.

Severus turned towards them as he heard their approach. He had been secretly summoned by Lupin and had agreed to meet, though he didn't know why. A half-spoken interrogation died on his lips as he saw Louisa staring at him with wide, dark eyes.

Severus gaped at her for a moment, his hair was limp and damp with half-dried sweat and his face and clothes were coated in the grimy film of battle and exertion. She had never seen anything more beautiful. In a moment, his arms had pulled her to him.

"I didn't…I didn't know," he gasped against the tangled mess of her hair, "I knew it was coming. I wanted to warn you. It happened too fast."

She shook her head against his chest, "It's alright. I'm alright." She inhaled deeply. She could still smell the earthy scent of potions ingredients on his robes, a reminder of a past life they had coincidentally spent together.

Something like a choked sob hiccupped in his chest. _He was twenty years old again. Hours before his death, Evan Rosier was telling him to take care of his sister. He was twenty-one and promising himself to Louisa forever, though not believing that his future or his heart were his to give. He was thirty-three and holding her hand while losing a son. He was thirty-five and tormented by her. _He was thirty-eight and, in that moment of elation, he would have moved heaven and earth for her.

He pulled away, cradling her face in his hands.

"You have to leave. You have to get to the Rosier estate. Hogwarts boundaries are only twenty metres away. You can apparate safely from there."

"I won't," her brow knitted, "you know I won't. Even Narcissa—"

"_You_ are not Narcissa. I can't let you be."

A faint rumbling in the direction of the castle grew slowly more noticeable. Severus grunted through clenched teeth as his Dark Mark burned with a force that shocked him into speechlessness. He tore his hands from her to cradle his forearm against himself.

"Go. Please," his eyes searched her face desperately, "Please let me know you're safe."

In those very last moments before parting, they had said nothing, only looked at each other plainly. A thousand unspoken declarations and renunciations hung in the air between them, but they remained silent.

He waited and watched as she ran into the surrounding forest, straining his ears until he heard the dull _pop_ of her apparition.

Lupin had spent the duration of their conversation feigning deep interest in the surrounding trees, his timepiece, the night sky, and, in desperation, his own fingernails. He renewed his attention when he noticed Louisa's retreat into the forest.

He stood sheepishly next to Snape for a moment. The faint sound of spells could be heard from the castle, but he remained.

"I'm…I'm glad you've moved on, Severus"

A quizzical glare answered him.

"Lily was very dear to us all," Remus raised his eyes to the taller wizard beside him, who looked at the ground in determination, "but it has been a long time."

"If you think I've forgotten her, you're a fool," came the flat, automatic reply.

Lupin sighed, knowing that the insult would be the best answer Severus could muster to such a line of conversation.

"You won't hurt any of the students?" he asked, already knowing the answer.

Severus met his gaze then with eyes wide and honest, "You have my word."

The two men made their necessarily separate ways back to Hogwarts. There were, perhaps, forty metres between them when Severus saw flashes of spells light up the darkened patch of trees into which Lupin had entered. Another moment and a flash of green light later, the unmistakable, shadowy form of Antonin Dolohov crept from the forest to a clearing before sprinting to Voldemort's camp.

Severus had torn through the forest, nearly stumbling over Remus' still body. A sharp pang of sorrow and regret made Severus' chest tighten and his throat ache. Remus had been the last person to know about Lily. And he hadn't deserved to die.

Silently, he shifted the lifeless body to lie on its back. He folded Remus' hands across his stiff torso. He delicately pulled his eyelids closed. Raising his wand, Severus let loose a stream of red sparks into the dark sky.

He knew then that it was time. That the moment had come when he would obtain the Dark Lord's permission to find Potter, tell Potter the full extent of what had been kept secret, and the final stages of Dumbledore's plan would fall into place.

Later, looking into the eyes of her son, Severus thought of Lily as he felt life flow out and away from him on the hard floor of the Shrieking Shack.

_This is it_ he had thought _It ends where it began, where it had to end. With her. Always with her. Always._


	13. Go Ahead

The Loss of Ours: Chapter 12

By Polexia Aphrodite

Notes: This took a while to get up. Life got in the way, big time. Enjoy. Reviews are always greatly appreciated.

Also, the beginning of this scene is continued from the prologue.

* * *

**1998**:

Seeing him again, she found her mind unexpectedly blank. The hours before had seen her grief for his apparent death mingled with mind-numbing fury and despair. He had chosen at last. And now the whole wizarding world knew how he had devoted his life to love for another woman. She would spend the rest of her life enduring the pity of others for being the wife of a man who had never loved her. But worse than the pity of others was her own sense of realization. She had loved him in every way she could have. And she was not reciprocated. After McGonagall left, Louisa sat motionlessly, expressionlessly, in a chair beside her husband's bed, mourning the loss of the life she had once coveted until sleep finally claimed her.

When she woke, a strange figure sat in the chair opposite her on the other side of the bed. Momentary confusion quickly gave way to shock. The scar, the green eyes (_her_ eyes), the glasses, the tousled hair. She straightened, unable to comprehend the idea of sharing her vigil with the son of her rival, but unable to leave.

Potter looked up at her. He was calm, collected, his face was utterly serene, like a statue of the Buddha, but Louisa could feel herself trembling with a glut of emotions. The two looked at each other for a long moment. She wanted to throw him from the room. She wanted to force any memory of _her_ from their lives. But the realization that Potter was not the unwelcome one in that room, that it was she who was truly irrelevant, gutted her and kept her still.

He came back again the next day.

"You're his wife?" he asked.

"Yes," she had replied, her shoulders straightening, wanting to appear proud even if she didn't feel it.

He shrugged, "I didn't know he was married."

"He is."

Potter nodded.

He regained consciousness three weeks later. Potter had come and gone from time to time, as had McGonagall, but Louisa remained. Neither of them spoke to her.

She was alone with him when he woke. He groaned what sounded like her name and her heart soared for a moment before her mind suppressed it. She cursed the fact that she and Lily Potter's names started with the same letter and sound.

Over three days, he drifted in and out of consciousness. On the day he finally spoke properly, Potter had sat at his right, Louisa in her usual place at his left. McGonagall had stood at the end of the bed.

His eyes had a squinty, fluttering quality to them, as if the light was too bright. His voice was creaky and faint from lack of use.

"Potter?" he finally managed.

"Yes," the younger man had answered, standing and moving closer to the edge of the bed, "I'm here."

"Am I dead?"

Potter blinked, "No."

"Good," through the dull ache that permeated every part of his body and consciousness, Severus dimly recognized that this meant Potter was alive as well, a fact he was strangely grateful for.

"How are you feeling, Severus?" McGonagall interjected.

He peered down the length of the bed at her, but said nothing. He swallowed painfully and turned back to Potter. Louisa heard a frustrated sigh escape the Headmistress. She felt somehow gladdened by the fact that she wasn't the only one he was ignoring.

"You saw…the memories?" he struggled with the words slightly, Potter had to bend nearer to hear him.

"Yes," for a moment, Potter opened his mouth to say more, but seemed to think better of it.

"Good," he swallowed again, unable to hide his grimace at the overwhelming discomfort, "You didn't…tell anyone…what you saw?"

"I did, but you've been pardoned," Potter's brow furrowed in confusion, "It's all over now."

There was a silent moment. Louisa heard only the rasps of his breathing, McGonagall looked at her, only for a moment, but Louisa had sensed her sympathy and would have given anything to tell her exactly what she could do with her pity. She kept her face placid.

"L…Louisa," he finally muttered, looking at Potter, his eyes bloodshot and raw but desperate even so.

"I'm here," she said clearly, standing.

His brow furrowed, "Can't…can't see you."

It was then that she knew he had lost part of his vision. She moved to Potter's side of the bed. The younger wizard still stood between them, but she felt too insecure to move him.

"Go…Potter, Minerva…go."

"But Professor-," Potter began. Louisa knew that all of his waiting had been for this moment, to ask his questions to her husband.

"Want…be alone with my wife…bloody Potter," his voice was becoming strained.

They left, exchanging exasperated looks with each other. She sat in Potter's vacant chair.

"How much did Potter tell?" he asked after a while.

"Let's just say Rita Skeeter's named you the 'Heathcliff' of our generation," she smirked mirthlessly.

His gaze was fixed on the ceiling as he spoke. Something inside him told him not to look at her, that he couldn't look at her, that seeing her face and knowing that she knew everything would break him.

He frowned and continued faintly, "I couldn't stop. It's my fault she died. And that damned Potter too. If I didn't love her…there wouldn't have been anyone left. Someone had to remember her."

"There was her _son_," his frown deepened, "Love shouldn't be a burden, Severus."

"Hasn't yours been?" she wasn't sure if the rasp in his voice was from his illness or from something else.

"I thought, sometimes, that it was," he managed to raise a cynical eyebrow, "but my love for Evan…for you…it's given me too much joy to be a burden." Admitting that she loved him sent a course of adrenaline through her veins and she continued, unable to stop herself, "What joy has loving her given you?" he opened his mouth to speak but she cut him off, "Not the boy you were then, when you knew her, but the man you are now. The man you have been for nearly twenty years. Does she still bring you happiness?"

"She loved me."

"Did she tell you that?"

He paused, "No."

"Why did she marry Potter?"

"That day after O.W.L.s…Mulciber and Avery…" his voice was trailing again.

"She wouldn't forgive you."

"…didn't deserve it."

She couldn't help grabbing his hand then, bending to touch her lips to the cool, blue-veined skin there, squeezing her eyes shut. "Don't say that," she murmured, "You did. You do."

Her breath was coming in short gasping sobs. She cursed the desperate, weepy voice that came out of her mouth, but was unable to steady it. It was the third time she had cried in front of him.

"I know you never chose this, Severus, that you never chose me, but can't you see that I've loved you where she hasn't? If she truly loved you, it was in spite of your flaws, but I love you now because of them. Your stubbornness, your sarcasm, all your complicated loyalties, they were too much for her and she turned you away for them, but to me," she paused, taking a deep, shaky breath, "any flaw you might have only makes me surer of my feelings."

She could have punched him in the stomach. He felt at once nauseous, elated, terrified, faint. They had experienced countless instances of physical ecstasy together, but they had never gone _this far_. But Louisa wasn't done. While Severus burned, she stormed ahead.

Her eyes were dry now, but they gleamed bright in the glaring light of the hospital ward.

"I love you, you must know that," her voice was quieter, calmer, but bolder, "I shouldn't make you choose, I should let you be, but I _want_ you to choose me. It's all I've ever wanted from you."

He looked at her. It took his entire strength, but he looked at her. He knew he loved her then. He could feel the reciprocal words rising to the forefront of his mind. In a moment, he would speak them, she would wrap her arms around his shoulders (delicately, given his condition) and they would go home and grow old.

But Severus Snape was nothing if not disciplined. He had felt his devotion to Lily slip in the presence of his wife so many times before, and each time he had overcome the momentary lapse. Now, that Lily-part of him, the fragmented, rebellious segment that spurned the life he could have had with Louisa, screamed at him. And he listened. He felt his mind rally, his expression grew hard, his eyes cold.

All Louisa heard was _I can't_ and _I'm sorry_ and all she felt was his hand slipping away from hers and she pulled herself away from him, out the door, out of the magical, sterile hospital, and all the way home. She knew she would not return.


	14. Ripchord

The Loss of Ours: Chapter 13

By Polexia Aphrodite

Notes: So it took me almost three years to get this up. But in three years I got a graduate degree, moved a few times, got a job, and got married. So, you know, I've been busy. Also, I wrote the actual end of this story three years ago, and since I've known all along how it ends, I felt weirdly resolved about this story even though I hadn't written all the connective tissue to actually get it to the end. But I've gotten some great feedback lately and decided to finally finish it. It shouldn't take me quite so long to write the next chapter, I _promise_, and then it's not long to the end.

Reviews are so very appreciated. Thank you so much to all those who have been reading, reviewing and following this story. Hearing from you just brightens up my day :)

* * *

The next day, Severus was arrested. As it turned out, the advocacy of the Boy Who Lived was not enough to exonerate a murderer and a Death Eater. No charges were pressed in the case of Dumbledore's death, but he was found tangentially culpable in a handful of other deaths, not the least of which were the deaths of Lily and James Potter.

He remained at St. Mungo's, still too ill to be moved.

A month passed, the weather grew colder, and the trial against Severus Snape was assembled. Most other former Death Eaters had either fled the country or been granted immunity for their cooperation with the Aurors. As one of the few remaining Death Eaters to be tried, and perhaps one of the most notorious, Severus regularly found his name emblazoned across the _Daily Prophet_'s front page, but he had expected it.

Though Harry Potter visited him weekly, Louisa remained conspicuously absent. Then, three weeks before the trial, just as suddenly as she had left, she reappeared alongside him in the pages of the _Daily Prophet_.

She didn't make the front page, which was still dedicated to analyses of his upcoming trial, but there she was on the second page. In a large, candid photograph, she and Narcissa Malfoy strolled through the main lobby of the Ministry of Magic, its dark walls gleaming behind them. Narcissa, all platinum hair and inch-long lacquered fingernails, extended an arm around Louisa's shoulders. A haughty, self-satisfied smile twisted her unnaturally reddened lips as she surveyed a team of reporters before her.

Louisa strode alongside her. Like Narcissa, she was impeccably made-up; it was the kind of high polish she usually adopted around Death Eaters. Her face was a mask of disdain and ennui. Her mouth was twisted into a sneer that would have put the former potions master's to shame. Her left arm was bent at the elbow, holding aloft a lime-green wizarding cigarette between her first and middle fingers. Severus hadn't seen her smoke in years. The loose sleeve of her robe slid down, exposing the top of her Dark Mark – its outline was still clearly visible though the marks had all begun fading shortly after Voldemort was killed.

Above the image, a block-letter headline blared: DEATH EATER DAMES' DECADENCE OUTRAGES VICTIMS' FAMILIES. Severus scanned the article below. Since she had left his hospital room, Louisa and Narcissa had fallen in together. The text before him described lavish dinners, all-night parties at the Malfoy estate, spending sprees. Narcissa had been overheard complaining of boredom since the Dark Lord's fall, Louisa had become notorious for violently hexing reporters who approached her for interviews, and both had been overheard making disparaging comments against "mudbloods."

And they had both agreed to testify against him.

* * *

With only one week left before the trial, Severus' neck grew stiffer, then more limber. The dark, poisoned flesh on his neck lightened in color, settling into the mottled purple complexion that he would learn to live with.

It wasn't long before he was deemed well enough to be moved to a holding cell deep inside the Ministry headquarters. The cell was dank and cold, but fairly large - probably meant to hold a number of criminals but emptied in anticipation of Severus' arrival. His reputation had only grown. His only visitors were his counsel, a small, ministry-appointed, bespectacled man who seemed perpetually flummoxed, and Harry.

Left mostly on his own, Severus found his mind repeatedly drawn back to his last conversation with Louisa. The more he thought about her, the more he knew the truth. He knew that Lily's time in his life was at an end, he knew that he loved Louisa, and that he had loved her for a very long while. Something in him was altered. He found himself accepting these realizations calmly, suddenly knowing them to be mere facts.

But there was one truth that he could not accept easily. He knew he had ruined any hope of a future with Louisa. He spent the interminable days and nights leading up to his trial willing himself to come to terms with his own hopelessness.

* * *

But then, three days before the trial, Louisa was standing before him, having been led in to his cell by Harry Potter along with Narcissa Malfoy. Severus had been lying motionless on his cell's cot in an attempt to overcome the throbbing in his neck, but raised himself to a seated position. His heart swelled to see his wife again. Though they had at times spent months apart, the last month, with no hope of reunion, had been the most difficult.

As they entered, Harry mumbled a speech about needing to be brief to avoid being seen by Severus' guards and abruptly left the three of them alone.

Narcissa primly lowered herself into a threadbare chair. Louisa leaned against a cold stone wall, her arms crossed, staring at the floor.

"I'm sure this must seem odd," Narcissa began after clearing her throat. The timbre of her voice, normally characterized by its high, tinkling ultra-femininity, was lower and more serious than he had ever heard. "But it was imperative that we speak with you before we take the stand."

Severus stared at her in silence.

She cleared her throat again, glancing around the room uncomfortably. She looked at Louisa in search of encouragement, but was met by her direct stare and an impatiently arched eyebrow. She turned back to Severus.

"I'll testify on the first day. Louisa will be one of the last to go. I don't know if you've been reading the papers, but she's turned out to be one of their star witnesses."

"I've heard," his voice was quiet and Louisa risked sneaking a glance in his direction. He was perched on a cot anchored against the cell's wall; his hands gripped the edge of its frame. She wondered if the tension she sensed in him was anger or an effort to stay upright despite his healing injuries.

"Look," Narcissa's voice was tinged with irritation – the conversation was not going as she had planned. "The point is that you should just follow our lead. And that solicitor of yours – Huxley? – get him to come after us. I _know_ he's incompetent, but give him something to work with. Tell him – "

She hesitated for a moment, casting another fruitless glance in Louisa's direction before continuing.

"Make sure he brings up the Unbreakable Vow. And how Lou had to be forced to marry you. And how she wasn't faithful. And everything you've ever heard us say against mudbloods. And how we all looked down on you for being half-blood."

Severus was looking straight at her, trying to ignore the stabbing pain in his chest that parts of her speech had caused. His brow furrowed. He didn't understand it. He didn't know if he wanted to. But he nodded in agreement anyway.

"You've both got your immunity then?" he cringed to hear the bitterness in his voice.

Narcissa's eyes grew wide and imploring. Her pragmatism was hastily overthrown by her feelings of dramatic indignation. "You don't know what it's like out there, Severus. For us _purebloods_, I mean. It's like a revolution."

"And you're the nobility?" He couldn't resist a small smile. The Malfoys' inflated sense of self-importance would never really change.

She leaned back in the chair, miffed at his sarcasm. "Yes, well, lucky for you, you've got sodding Marie Antoinette here mounting the scaffold for you," Narcissa gestured toward Louisa and rolled her eyes.

Before Severus could absorb the statement, a shuffling in the hallway drew their attention and Harry appeared at the door. He was anxious. "We should get out of here. I think the guards' next shift change is soon."

Narcissa stood and both women made for the door.

"Wait," there was a lump in Severus' throat, "I'd like to talk with Louisa, if I could."

Narcissa gave Louisa a concerned look, but his wife shrugged and lagged behind as Harry and Narcissa left. She would never admit to a curiosity about what he might have left to say to her.

* * *

Narcissa's exit was followed by a long, terrible silence.

Finally, Severus spoke.

"You were right."

She barely heard him, he spoke so quietly. But his eyes, gleaming beetle-black in the dim candlelight, met hers and she couldn't ignore his unaffected earnestness.

"In light of…everything, I shouldn't bring this up again, but I've thought it over and I…I don't know when I'll get this chance again, or if I ever will," he stopped, mentally rallying himself. He took a long breath and continued. "It's just that it seemed—She didn't-I thought, for so long, that she – Lily – felt something for me that was more than friendship. I thought…I was so sure that Potter had tricked her or hexed her or…"

He stopped himself again, finding himself suddenly without words. Louisa remained unmoved. Severus' gaze dropped to the floor.

"I wanted to believe that she loved me, but she didn't," his brow creased, but something about his expression seemed lighter. Even Louisa, who in the last weeks had felt a sort of scar tissue envelop and harden around her heart, could see a change in him. He continued. "I'm glad she didn't. I don't mean I don't feel guilty for what happened, for how she died. That can't ever be helped. But I can't keep the rest of it up anymore."

"The rest of it?" Louisa shifted uneasily.

"Loving Lily. Feeling like I loved her. Thinking that I loved her. Doubting myself for it," his mind was working rapidly. He had never dared to say aloud that he was tired of loving Lily, but now that he had, he felt revolutionary, mercenary and manic. He stepped forward, closing the gap between himself and his wife.

His confession had shocked her into speechlessness. She had given up hope, but now he stood mere inches from her and he had renounced the woman who had been her rival for seventeen years.

"Will you be at the trial?" The thought of seeing her there was undeniably comforting. But he braced himself for disappointment.

Louisa focused her eyes at a point somewhere behind his shoulder, "No. I'll be there towards the end, like Narcissa said."

"You're really testifying against me?" Severus felt low for asking her. He had given her every reason to.

She looked up then, meeting his eyes squarely. Her voice was soft, and more tender than he deserved.

"Everything will be fine," she swallowed, "I have to go now."

And then she was gone again.

* * *

As she had promised, Narcissa Malfoy testified on the first day of the trial. Louisa was absent.

Severus would have been lying if he had claimed not to have been amazed by Narcissa's testimony. Perched on the witness stand, she was every inch a high-society doyenne, straight-backed and inherently confident. But underneath the expected simpering and uselessness, she let show a dangerous undercurrent. She made oblique references to Death Eater secrets she was privy to and to dark deeds she had done herself, but stopped short of a full confession. For the life of him, Severus could not imagine to what she could have been referring. On the whole, she claimed that Severus had been an ignoramus, haplessly pulled into a world of pureblood politics beyond his understanding.

Then, when Severus' prosecutor asked her outright whether or not she believed he deserved punishment for his crimes, she denied it. Even the prosecutor, a sinewy, shrewd-faced man, was taken aback.

Severus couldn't have known it then, but the stage had been set.


	15. Speak Up

For two weeks the trial continued. Evidence was presented, witnesses were called. Severus remained indifferent to the proceedings, already knowing the outcome.

Then, finally, Louisa was called. She rose from the viewing theatre and strode towards the witness stand. Her head was held high. Artfully darkened eyelids and blood-red lips rendered her nearly unrecognizable.

As she walked, a strange noise grew louder from a corner of the theatre. It was a long, surreal moment before Severus realized that the crowd was hissing at her. Louisa tossed her hair, flashing a condescending smile at her detractors. It was only as she turned to step onto the witness stand below the Wizengamot Interrogators, with her back to the crowd, that Severus saw her smirk falter. A row of reporters scratched furiously on their notepads.

A sudden realization swept over Severus, and he saw what Louisa and Narcissa had done. They had given the crowd someone else to hate. Louisa had presented wizarding Britain with a character more loathsome, more bigoted and arrogant than Severus. Disconnected from the world during his confinement, he hadn't realized the extent of what they had done. His mind raced as he observed the crowd's reaction. Even the Wizengamot members shifted uncomfortably as she took the stand, some crossing their arms in disapproval. It was a diversion.

As with the previous witnesses, she was administered a dose of Veritaserum and asked a series of simple, factual questions to test the potion's efficacy. Her name. Her age. Once the cursory questions were complete, the Interrogators began.

"Describe your relationship with Severus Snape," an Interrogator ordered. The Chief Warlock looked down at her, frowning and sitting forward in his seat.

She sighed. "We were instructed to marry by the Dark Lord in 1981."

"And was this arrangement agreeable to you both?"

Louisa raised an eyebrow. "The Rosier bloodline is ancient. My ancestors knew _Merlin_. No, marrying a mudblood has never been _agreeable_."

The slur evoked uncomfortable gasps from the audience. An elderly Interrogator chastised her for the use of the word and she rolled her eyes. The row of press was nearly in hysterics.

The Chief Warlock cleared his throat pointedly and the crowd settled. He continued, "Mrs. Snape, what are your thoughts on the accusations made against your husband?"

She shrugged. "I believe some more than others."

An Interrogator gestured for her to continue.

Louisa pursed her lips and shifted in her seat.

"Look, there's a certain set of witches and wizards who were born to follow the Dark Lord. To speak plainly, Severus wasn't one of them."

The Principle Interrogator's brow furrowed. This was not the testimony they had agreed upon.

"He was young, and lost, once, and the wrong people found him." She leaned back in her seat, glowering, her heavy makeup making her seem ghoulish under the bright lights of the Wizengamot witness stand, and looking for all the world like one of the wrong people.

"But he did choose to become a Death Eater."

She smirked.

"Well, yes, lots of us did, but he was always too soft for it. I understand that the schoolchildren of Hogwarts fear him, but I assure you they are the only ones."

"Do you believe Severus Snape to be guilty of murder?" He was growing impatient now.

"I suppose so. We know he killed Dumbledore. But a real kill," her eyes narrowed, making her look cold and ruthless, "A kill without mercy, that's something he would never have had the stomach for. All the things they say about him – that he was Dumbledore's spy, that he's been protecting Harry bloody Potter," her mouth twisted in disgust, "Frankly it sounds exactly like something he _would_do."

The Principle Interrogator, watching his carefully planned case dissolve before him as his fellow Interrogators grew visibly confused, cleared his throat, his voice rising impatiently, "And what about James and Lily Potter? Wasn't he responsible for their deaths?"

The crowd grew silent. Severus froze.

Louisa, however, scoffed irreverently. "Of course not. It was the Dark Lord who killed them. Snape knew nothing, as usual, until it was _fait_ _accompli_."

The Principle Interrogator leapt to his feet, his face flushed in anger. "You are dismissed, Mrs. Snape."

She shrugged, stood, and returned to her seat in the audience.

* * *

At the trial's next recess, Louisa made for the chamber door where she was stopped by Harry, who whispered something unintelligible but urgent and asked her to follow him. She did, at a distance, trying not to lose him in the crowded Ministry hallways.

Harry ushered her into a small room and quietly closed the door behind her, leaving her momentarily alone on the other side of it.

She turned. Severus stood in the center of the room, all aching, stiff shoulders and starched black robes, and she approached him cautiously. She had been trying to mask her trembling since the beginning of her testimony and, in his presence, felt near collapse.

He moved quickly, meeting her halfway. He hesitated for a moment. Then, seeing her up close, seeing how her eyes were red-rimmed, her lipstick faded, her skin clammy and pale, he was overwhelmed. His arms wrapped around her, pulling her against him. He heard a soft whimper against his shoulder and struggled against the increasing tightness in his own chest.

"How did you get past the Veritaserum?" he whispered against her hair.

"I don't know what you're talking about," came the muffled reply.

Severus smiled in spite of himself. There were ways around the serum, of course, but they would have required either rigorous preparation or the ingestion of near-toxic counter-serums.

He looked down at her, frowning. "Why did you do this?"

Her lips curved into a half-smile. Her slender fingers traced a button on the front of his jacket. "This is what we do. We survive. We fight."

Her hair was curled around his fingers; the palm of his hand cupped her jaw, traced the lines of her neck. "Please don't leave me again."

His words, his unexpected tenderness, made Louisa close her eyes and cringe. She could no longer allow him to affect her like this. But he was looking down at her, his eyes were dark and pleading, and she couldn't remember a time she had seen him rendered so vulnerable because of her. She had seen him torn asunder and laid low by Lily, by Dumbledore, but never by her alone. Until then.

"I need you." His forehead was pressed against hers.

"You don't. You said so."

"I was wrong."

Severus knew that that was the moment to truly tell her his feelings. But something stopped him. He would later think of it as a kind of mental blockage, something habitually built up over the years that prevented him from saying the words. He hadn't told her how he felt until then, and, in that moment, doubted his capability to ever do so.

He had half a moment to register her expression – conflicted, infatuated, unsure – before he pressed his lips against hers. Then she was kissing him back, her arms were flung around his shoulders as he pulled her roughly against him, needing every point of contact. His mouth was on her jaw, her throat, her collarbone. Severus pulled at her robes until the neck was unbuttoned and open.

She gasped in surprise as he pushed her back against a wall. His neck and shoulders throbbed, but he ignored the pain.

For two full minutes, they were both lost and found. _Please please please_Severus chanted in a hoarse whisper as his lips found her cheekbones, eyelids, forehead, mouth, losing track of what precisely he was begging her for. Louisa felt dazed, her hands hung helplessly in the air, occasionally finding purchase on his shoulders, arms, the back of his neck.

Then her head cleared and her small, white hands pressed against his chest. "Come on, now," she said in a tone so quiet and reasonable that Severus couldn't help but pause.

He looked down at her. Her eyes, glassy but focused, met his.

"This isn't for us," she said, her voice soft and serious.

He shook his head in confusion.

"We're not in love," she continued, "Remember?"

He remembered the night, not so long ago, he had said those words to her and felt a sharp jab of regret. His face fell, his eyes squeezed shut briefly, his brow furrowed. "I've been so stupid," he whispered. He had spent so many years pushing her away, leaving her, that now it was impossible to make her stay.

She smiled up at him wistfully and brought her hand to cup his cheek.

"Good luck, Severus."

And then, in a flurry of opulent robes, she was gone again.

* * *

Note: I think there's just one more chapter to go. Thanks for reading and reviewing, everybody!


	16. Our Day Will Come

Note: The fact that this story is over just breaks my heart. As much as I'm convinced that Louisa and I would _not_ get along in real life, I've enjoyed writing her and Severus' story, and I hope you all have enjoyed reading it.

As a final disclaimer, only Louisa belongs to me, the rest is the property of J.K. Rowling.

As a final credit, all of the story titles are taken from the lyrics to songs by the group Rilo Kiley, with the exception of this chapter, which is titled after an Amy Winehouse song (cover?) that reminds me of where the story ends.

I have also taken an absurd amount of inspiration from John R. Parsons' photographs of the stunning Jane Morris sitting in a wicker chair. Anyone who is interested in knowing what Louisa would have looked like need only Google these photos.

Most importantly, thank you so much to everyone who has reviewed this story over the years, and who inspired me to finish it.

* * *

**Our day will come**  
**If we just wait a while**  
**No tears for us**  
**Make love and wear a smile**

* * *

**Late Summer/Early Autumn, 1998**

Twenty-four hours later, Severus was acquitted. It was an outcome he had never dreamed of, never dared to hope for. The Daily Prophet would later credit Louisa's testimony with his salvation, while simultaneously lamenting that she could not have been prosecuted in Severus' stead.

With his freedom, however, Severus was struck by the revelation that he had nowhere to go - no home to return to. It was Minerva McGonagall who met him as he exited his Ministry cell, clutching a meager knapsack of his belongings, and it was Minerva who brought him back to Hogwarts.

As headmistress, she would, she told him, reinstate him as Potions Master eventually. Horace Slughorn was eager to re-enter his retirement, but the transition would have to be gradual to avoid alarming oversensitive parents. For the time being, Severus would serve as adjunct faculty.

* * *

He was surprised at how easy it was to re-adjust to life at Hogwarts but, though it seemed like a lifetime ago, it had only been a few months since he had left.

In the weeks before the term started and before the school was inundated with students, Severus settled into an easy pattern - walking the Hogwarts grounds in the early mornings, before the late summer heat set in, and spending his afternoons in the school's cool, underground potions laboratory. He even resumed research he had begun years ago, before life became irreversibly complicated.

Despite his acquittal, his colleagues ignored him with a fierce determination. Even Minerva remained hesitant to be seen speaking to him publicly. Though he had been shunned before, Severus found himself confronted for the first, real time with infinite loneliness and determined to prepare himself for a lifetime of solitude.

* * *

Severus was at the school for three weeks before he saw her again. He had spent the morning buried in the empty, silent stacks of the Hogwarts library. Finally selecting three heavy, hundred-year-old tomes with long passages on the history of the Draught of the Living Death, Severus made his way to the library's front desk, anticipating nothing more than a brief exchange with the officious, unpleasant Madam Pince. Instead, his wife was seated in her place, taking his books with a small smile of recognition and filling in his name and the date on their book cards.

The exchange happened so quickly and unceremoniously that Severus nearly gathered his books and left, as planned. But then, at the last moment, he stalled.

"What are you doing here?" he demanded in a harsher tone than he had intended.

"Madam Pince retired," she stated simply. On his confused stare, she continued, "You remember I helped her when we were here. When she left, McGonagall asked me to come back. Not like anyone else would have me, anyway." She flashed a wry smile.

"How long have you been here?"

She shrugged, "A few weeks."

"Did you know I was here?"

She hesitated for a moment, then nodded, looking away.

His face fell, "I see."

It felt terrible. Like they were two strangers meeting. Like she had never been Evan's sister, never been his wife, never been the woman he loved.

Unable to look at her, he nodded a goodbye, gathered his books and turned to the door.

She stood suddenly, her hands perched on the desk before her.

"Severus," he turned back, and her mouth hung open wordlessly for a moment. "I'm sorry. I should have said something earlier."

A pause settled between them, their eyes were locked together, each trying desperately to read the other.

"H-How have you been?," Louisa finally asked in a barely audible voice.

"Well. And you?"

"Fine, thank you."

Another silence threatened them, but instead Severus nodded in recognition, turned and left quickly, black robes billowing behind him.

* * *

Two days later, Severus began his morning walk as usual. Thoughts of Louisa, of what he had lost, of what little he had to look forward to, had plagued him day and night since he saw her in the library, but he had insisted on keeping his new schedule in hopes of bringing order to his disordered life.

On this morning, though, he decided to change his usual course, walking east around the lake, on a path that would, if followed to its end, lead to Hogsmeade and the Shrieking Shack.

The lake shone silver in the early morning light. The air was still crisp, but golden light filtered through the trees above, foretelling a warm afternoon.

Severus was nearly a quarter of the way around the lake when he saw Louisa. She sat near the water's edge on a grass-covered embankment, her violet-colored robes drawn around her. Though the sight of her made his gut twist in apprehension, he couldn't help smiling. While the students of Hogwarts, and even some of its staff had taken to wearing Muggle clothes outside of school hours, Louisa would never.

She heard him approach and looked up.

"May I join you?" he asked, surprising himself.

Her lips curved into a shy smile. She nodded.

He sat down beside her.

Severus cleared his throat, "Why aren't you at breakfast?"

She looked at him, one eyebrow raised. "Why aren't _you_?"

"Fair enough," he smiled in spite of himself.

She sighed, staring straight ahead. "They hate us."

"Always have."

"I really am sorry about before," she said, her eyes never leaving the water in front of them. "I've been thinking about...everything, and-" She stopped and looked at him and he met her gaze. "I don't see why we can't be friends, don't you think?"

The proposal made his heart soar and his head spin. It would be enough, he thought, just to be near her again, and to know that she wanted him there. He couldn't trust himself to speak, so he simply nodded. They spent the morning together there, by the lake, and walked back to the castle side by side.

* * *

Summer finally faded into autumn. Leaves changed colors and hoards of students, new and old, filled the school.

While the weather held out, Severus and Louisa met every morning by the lake before classes started. In talking to her, Severus found himself truly listening for the first time. For the first time, he wasn't burdened by thoughts of Lily or distracted by his own insistence on distancing himself from her.

He learned that she was writing a history of the Hogwarts library. He read her drafts and discovered that she was a skilled writer. She reviewed his potions research and he found that she understood it easily, and better than he expected.

Together, without the looming specter of Lily, Louisa and Severus were relaxed, familiar, peaceful. Yet Severus felt an acute sense of loss, without knowing that Louisa felt it too. While they reveled in their newfound companionship, they both grieved in silence for the loss of years when they could have been happy together.

* * *

When the weather worsened, he visited her in the library. The older students, the students who had been at Hogwarts during the last two, awful years and followed the Death Eater trials, watched them interact carefully. Every time Severus leaned a little too casually against her desk or elicited a genuine smile or a barely-stifled laugh from Louisa, a new spate of rumors spread through the student body and around the faculty lounge.

On one such visit, when the library was empty except for a sixth-year couple who had disappeared and who Louisa and Severus strongly suspected were feeling each other up in the stacks, Severus picked up her nameplate. It was an item he noticed on each visit, but had never had the courage to mention.

"Still 'Madam Snape'?" he asked, running his fingers across the engraved name.

"That's what it says. Do you object?" She was looking up at him from the desk with a teasing half-smile, but her eyes were wary.

When Louisa was hired, McGonagall had known that her testimony at Severus' trial was false and told her so. She had seen Louisa forgo food and rest to keep a constant vigil by Severus' hospital bed. Nonetheless, she had asked her if she wanted to return to using her maiden name. Louisa had refused, saying that she was simply accustomed to her married name, but privately she believed it was all she had left of him. All she had to prove it had all been real.

Severus' expression grew serious and the smile faded from Louisa's face.

"Not at all," he said quietly, setting the nameplate down and straightening it so that it sat parallel to the edge of her desk.

* * *

Together, they found that they cared less and less about the opinions of others, appearing together and sitting next to each other at the few meals they attended and whispering conspiratorially to each other in the back row of faculty meetings. They became each others' refuge against a castle full of detractors.

That Christmas, Horace Slughorn invited the entirety of the faculty to his annual party, and Severus and Louisa were invited by default. They arrived together. Each tried, independently and valiantly, to engage their colleagues and students in honest, natural conversation, and each failed miserably. Members from both groups abruptly excused themselves for invented reasons or outright turned their backs.

The couple eventually found themselves alone together in an abandoned corner of the room, spiking their pumpkin juice with pours from a flask of firewhiskey, mocking everyone who had rejected them. Their only visitor was Minerva, who spent seven minutes talking to them about the weather.

Severus' head swam as they made their way back to the dungeons under the lake. He couldn't quite remember leaving the party, but now Louisa was leaning against him as they walked, and he could feel her warm body under his arm. She was laughing and the sound echoed in the empty, stone hallways and then he was laughing too.

She shushed him loudly and stage whispered, "Here's where I live." She unlocked the door to her chamber and pulled him in behind her. "Come on, quick!"

She closed the door behind him. "I can't be in here." He could hear that his voice was slow and slurred.

"Don't worry, I'm allowing you," she said as she started up the fireplace and poured two glasses of elf-made wine.

The firelight made her skin glow. She had never looked more beautiful to him, all dark, heavy-lidded eyes and full, curving lips. She had been his and now she wasn't. His heart grew heavy, his balance faltered, and he sank to his knees.

Louisa saw him fall and cried out in exaggerated concern. Hurrying to his side, she stumbled onto him, sitting astride his lap with acres of fabric between them. Her arms were around his neck and her face was above his. "Are you alright?" His hands went to her waist to steady her.

She was so close, warm, and alive, and he had wanted her like this, in his arms, for months. By the way she grew suddenly quiet and dipped her head ever so slightly towards his, his dulled mind began to suspect that his feelings were reciprocated. Despite the bunched robes between them, he felt her hips move against his, and any resolve he might have had was destroyed.

They moved toward each other simultaneously, their mouths meeting in the middle. Her tongue stroked his and he began clawing at her skirts until they were gone and only the fabric of her underwear and his pants separated them. His hands gripping her hips, he thrust up against her, suddenly feeling himself barely contained. She moaned into his mouth. Her fingers gripped his shoulders, then moved to undo his cravat and the cloth-covered buttons leading down his jacket.

It took a full minute of frantic unbuttoning, unclasping, and unlacing until Severus was bare-chested beneath her. Her fingers and lips traced the familiar lines of scars and explored for the first time the mottled, poisoned flesh of his throat and left shoulder.

Severus had undone the back of her dress and pulled it down over her shoulders and off her arms. The corset beneath it was plain and white, with blue embroidered vines along the bustline. He recognized it. He had seen it countless times and had thought he would never see it again. Severus was overcome; he felt as though his heart might burst. With trembling fingers, he tore at the corset's laces and tossed it to the floor, pressing his bare chest against hers.

For Louisa, it was like being dunked in a tank of cold water. The fog in her mind cleared; she gasped and pushed against him, standing up and stumbling backward. Her robes were around her waist, her arms covered her breasts, her face buried in her palms.

_What am I doing What am I doing_she sobbed.

Severus leapt to his feet, crossing the room in what felt like a single step. His hands wrapped around her upper arms.

"What? What is it?"

She looked up at him, her face flushed and tear-stained, her voice weak and uneven. "We can't do this again. Not ever."

"Louisa-"

Her breathing was growing strained and ragged.

"You can't hurt me again. I can't let you."

Her stared at her, horrified, for a moment, then pulled her against him. She went limp, sobbing against his shoulder.

When her breathing slowed again and her shoulders stopped shaking, she murmured "Please, go" and he did.

* * *

Severus spent a sleepless night in his own chambers and was summoned to the Headmistress' office early the next morning.

Minerva told him that she was assigning him as a tutor to a group of advanced sixth and seventh years who had the potential to advance far beyond the confines of Slughorn's class. He agreed, still feeling dazed and distracted from the events of the night before.

"Are you alright, Severus?" Minerva asked him, her green eyes wide and sympathetic.

"I'm fine," came his reply, though the dark circles under his eyes told a different story.

Minerva examined him carefully, then cast a surreptitious glance at Dumbledore's portrait. She swallowed. "And Louisa? How has she been settling in?"

Severus rose from his seat, realizing that she had no more business to discuss.

"You'll have to ask her," he snarled, as he strode towards the door.

* * *

That afternoon he met with the advanced potions group. The group was composed of six students he recognized as the most talented he had taught at Hogwarts: three Ravenclaws, two Slytherins, and a Gryffindor.

As he took his place at the head of the otherwise-empty classroom, he addressed them, "As you may know, Headmistress McGonagall has requested that I tutor you in potions. I'm sure none of you are happy about it, but I assure you it was not my decision."

He turned to begin writing formulas on the chalkboard.

Behind him, the students exchanged glances. A seventh-year Slytherin boy finally spoke up.

"We requested you, Professor."

Severus turned, glaring at him in confusion.

He continued, "The only time we ever learned anything about potions was from you. Slughorn's rubbish."

A sixth-year Ravenclaw girl with blonde hair and a northern accent chimed in, "And we don't care what everyone says, we think you did right in the war."

Severus felt his chest constrict. He knew that the old Severus, master-of-espionage Severus, who hid who he was at all times, would sling back a sarcastic retort. But he wasn't that person anymore.

"Thank you," he said quietly, looking at the ground.

The class' single Gryffindor, a seventh-year boy who had even been in Dumbledore's Army, spoke next.

"Are you still with _her_though? People say they see you together, but -"

"That," Severus cut him off, "is no one's business." He looked at their faces and knew that they had fallen for Louisa and Narcissa's ruse. He decided to start a rumor of his own. He smiled mysteriously. "You can't always believe what you read in the papers. Or in court transcripts."

* * *

Neither Severus nor Louisa appeared at dinner that night. Severus spent the evening pacing his room, his mind a jumble of thoughts. Finally, at nearly midnight, Severus found himself at Louisa's door.

She was clad in a nightgown and robe, her feet were bare. He hadn't bothered to realize that it was nearly midnight. She stepped aside, and he entered, turned to face her and launched into the apology he had rehearsed for the past half-hour.

"Please allow me to apologize for last night. You know I never drink and I don't know what came over me. It was unforgivable." He raced through it, his nerves getting the better of him. When Louisa remained silent, he prepared to continue his _mea culpa_. Her hand on his arm stopped him.

"It's alright." She smiled the sad, understanding smile he had grown accustomed to seeing, "You weren't exactly alone."

She was so close, and even though he shouldn't have, he couldn't help bringing a hand to cup her jaw, his thumb brushing her cheek. "I made a promise to Evan, and to you," her heart stopped, as it always did when he mentioned her brother, "that I would always keep you safe and happy, and I've done such a miserable job. God, think of what he'd do to me if he had any idea of what I've put you through."

Despite his attempt at levity, Louisa could see that his eyes were starting to glisten in the dim light and she brought her hands up to touch his, pressing her cheek into his warm palm.

She said nothing, so he continued. "I swear to you now, though," he was on a roll, bending his head closer to her, filling the gap between them, bringing his other hand to the other side of her face, "I _swear_ to you, Louisa, I won't hurt you again. I _won't_." By the end of his oath, she had wrapped her arms around his neck and his arms were around her waist, his face buried in the crook of her neck. "Things are different now. _I'm_different. You changed me."

Her hand stroked the back of his neck. "I know."

They held each other for a long while. Then, she pulled back slightly. "It's late," she murmured.

He moved away, his hands still on her waist. His eyes were dry, but spots on his cheeks glinted in the candlelight.

His heart dropped and he struggled to keep his expression neutral. "I'll let you sleep, then."

"Stay."

* * *

Her bedroom was smaller than his, but neat. She hung her robe on a hook and slid under the covers. Stripped to his boxers, Severus followed her.

Moments later, in the dark and quiet, she led him to wrap his arms around her, his front meeting her back.

She had just fallen asleep when he felt his arms, almost of their own volition, tighten around her. She pressed against him without opening her eyes, still striving for rest after the long, sleepless night before.

She was only vaguely aware of his presence as he burrowed through her unruly, sleep-mangled hair to rest his chin on the curve between her neck and shoulder.

She heard him sigh, a sound made louder by his proximity to her ear. In that moment, Severus felt somehow lighter, almost giddy, feeling freer than he had in years, even decades. Louisa's skin was soft under his fingers, her hair touched his face lightly, her legs shifted, brushing his, and he could wait no longer.

"Louisa?"

A sleepy grunt answered him.

He felt the words bubbling up in his chest. He could have shouted them in his sudden exhilaration, but he knew that it was too sacred for that.

"I love you."

Her eyelids lifted and she turned to face him in the dark.

"What?" her voice was soft and groggily slurred.

Under her gaze, he felt strangely nervous. Where a moment ago he had been filled with courage and inspiration, he was suddenly awkward, hesitant, exposed.

"You…you heard me before," he stammered, punctuating his assertion with a huff for emphasis.

By the tone of his voice, she almost could have believed that she had imagined it, but his fingers were tracing her collarbone and she could practically feel his rapid heart beat where their chests met.

"Maybe I didn't," she countered. But she had, and it made her expression split into an impossibly wide grin.

He sighed again, a sound loaded with resignation and insuppressible devotion.

"I'm in love with you," he caught his breath, "Louisa."

The only thing she could do to stop herself from crying was to take his face in her hands and raise her lips to his.

After a few breathless minutes, Severus pulled himself away from her, gently at first, then more assertively.

She looked at him silently, terrified at the thought that something had gone wrong.

He swallowed, not meeting her eyes.

"Aren't you—I thought—Shouldn't you…say it back?"

A jolt of insecurity flashed through him. Since she left the hospital so many months ago, since he had first been sure of his feelings for her, he had grown steadily more unsure of her feelings for him.

She said it back instantaneously, pulling him back against her.

By the time they finally allowed each other to sleep, they had made seven such declarations and reciprocations. Severus had counted them all.


End file.
